Ladybird, Ladybird

I have been very slow off the mark getting interested in ladybirds, probably distracted by bees and dragonflies in the summer and not fully realising that ladybirds are easier to find when they are hibernating in the winter.  The North East Ladybird Spot has run for two years now and I thought it was about time I joined in so I enrolled on a winter ladybird field skills course led by James Common, our local expert, for the Natural History Society of Northumbria.  The aim is to find all North East species over five field trips in consecutive weeks.

We began a week earlier with a preliminary trip to Gosforth Nature Reserve, looking for and finding Water Ladybird (Anisosticta novemdecimpunctata).

A bonus on this trip was a 22-spot Ladybird (Psyllobora vigintiduopunctata) shaken from gorse.

The first week proper was a trip to Old Jesmond Cemetery.  Old sandstone gravestones under tree cover in urban cemeteries are apparently the best place to look and we found eight species:

18-spot Ladybird (Myrrha octodecimguttata).  This one is darker and less well marked than usual.

Pine Ladybird (Exochomus quadripustulatus), here two with a 2-spot Ladybird.

This is a black four spot form of the 2-spot Ladybird (Adalia bipunctata f. quadrimaculata) on the right, with another Pine Ladybird on the left.

10-spot Ladybird (Adalia decempunctata) in three colour forms, decempunctata, and two versions of decempustulatus.

Cream-spot Ladybird (Calvia quatuordecemguttata).

Orange ladybird (Halyzia sedecimguttata).

7-spot Ladybird (Coccinella septempunctuata).

Harlequin ladybird (Harmonia axyridis).

Searching in the cemetery simply involves walking around and looking but future trips will require a sweep net so I tried mine out at Banks' Pond at Dinnington and found the smallest ladybird I have ever seen.  I had to use a x10 hand lens even to see what it was.  It wasn't in my pocket guide so I took a few photos, not easy on a windy day with something so small.  When I got home and looked it up I found it was a Pine Scymnus, Scymnus suturalis, a very small hairy brown ladybird that eats pine aphids.  The mesh of the net is 2.5 threads per mm so this is 2mm long.  I have seen bigger aphids.

In 2021-22 the North East Ladybird Spot recorded 27 species with 115 observers submitting 2330 records.  Many species that were thought to be scarce this far north turn out to be widespread and not so rare now that people are looking for them.  When I looked back I have in fact seen 2-spot, 7-spot, 10-spot, 14-spot, Orange and Harlequin Ladybirds in my garden previously but this year I shall hope to find a few more.