A year ago I learnt that winter is the best time to look for ladybirds and that graveyards are one of the best places to look. This winter I have been regularly popping into cemeteries and churchyards, armed with a torch and a camera. Here are a few of the ladybirds I have seen.
This is a red bimaculata form of 10-spot Ladybird in a small crevice in a gravestone in Jesmond.
This is a black bimaculata form of 10-spot Ladybird on an adjacent gravestone.
When I went back a week later to get a better photo of the red one the black one had joined it.
And a month later the red one had disappeared and been replaced by a Cream-spot Ladybird.
I have seen several other interesting variations of 10-spot Ladybird but they are often tucked away making it difficult to get a good photo.
Two Pine Ladybirds with different markings.
Pine Ladybirds are not the only black ladybirds with four red spots. Here is a Pine Ladybird at the top with two quadrimaculata forms of 2-spot Ladybird.
And an unusual 2-spot Ladybird, f. bar annulata.
Most ladybirds at this time of year are immobile but I found a Larch Ladybird wandering round on a gravestone in the sunshine at Slaley, a first for me. I have yet to find one in a larch tree.
An Eyed Ladybird, the largest UK species.
An Orange Ladybird.
A 7-spot Ladybird.
A 10-spot Ladybird, f. decempustulata.
And my favourite recent ladybird photo, two Water Ladybirds.
Having been to several churchyards and cemeteries that have no ladybirds I am gradually learning where they are more likely to be. Even then it is a bit unpredictable. Dinnington churchyard had none a year ago but four species when I returned this winter. I'll keep looking.
What a fantastic array! I hadn't heard of most of these and now I want to go out and look for them
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