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Spotted lady beetle

Coleomegilla maculata

Notes:

Coleomegilla maculata is a large coccinellid beetle native to North America. The adults and larvae feed primarily on aphids and the species has been used as a biological control agent. The spotted lady beetle is about six millimetres long, more flattened than most species of lady beetle, pink or red with six spots on each wing cover. The thorax is a similar shade of red with two large triangular black patches. The larvae resemble miniature alligators and are dark coloured. They have three pairs of legs and grow to about six millimetres long. The eggs are spindle shaped and laid upright in groups near potential prey. A female beetle may lay up to 1,000,000 eggs in small groups in protected sites on stems and leaves over a three-month period. The larvae actively seek out prey and may travel as far as twelve metres in their search for food. The larvae grow rapidly, moulting four times before attaching themselves by the abdomen to a leaf or other surface to pupate. The adult beetles emerge from three to twelve days later depending on the temperature. There are two to five generations per year. This species is most abundant in September when they congregate before mating and winter hibernation. They overwinter in large aggregations in leaf litter, under stones and in other protected sites at the edge of fields and hedgerows. They emerge in spring and look for suitable prey and egg laying sites in nearby crops, often dispersing by walking along the ground. It has been found experimentally that interplanting a crop susceptible to aphid attack with a flowering plant such as the dandelion, Taraxacum officinale, encouraged predation on aphids because the spotted lady beetles were attracted to their pollen-rich flowers. The spotted lady beetle commonly oviposits on the native weed, Acalypha ostryaefolia, when it grows near sweet corn crops in Kentucky. A research study showed that the insect favoured the weed over the corn even though it housed no prey insects. The first instar larvae fell from the weed plants and crawled across the soil for a distance of up to eight metres a day before ascending a sweet corn plant or another weed plant. The presence of this weed, in close proximity to the crop, resulted in more beetle larvae on the crop than was the case when the weed was absent. Research showed that spotted lady beetle larvae were an important cause of natural mortality for Helicoverpa zea eggs on sweet corn. A study identified the spotted lady beetle as a significant predator of the eggs of the European corn borer, Pyrausta nubilalis, with consumption averaging sixty eggs per day. Another study has shown that the spotted lady beetle reduced populations of eggs and small larvae of the Colorado potato beetle, Leptinotarsa decemlineata, on potatoes and that the rate of consumption was highly correlated with the air temperature.

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Spotted Lady Beetle
Coleomegilla maculata


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3 Comments

Sckel
Sckel 10 years ago

oh, Thank you, Mister nutella

Sckel
Sckel 10 years ago

thank you very much for your help, anne

TaiRobinson
TaiRobinson 10 years ago

Beautiful creature!

Sckel
Spotted by
Sckel

Cariacica, ES, Brazil

Spotted on Nov 6, 2013
Submitted on Nov 6, 2013

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