Depending on the species, they can have spots, stripes, or no markings at all. Seven-spotted ladybugs are red or orange with three spots on each side and one in the middle. They have a black head with white patches on either side. Ladybugs are colorful for a reason. Their markings tell predators: "Eat something else! I taste terrible. They may also play dead. Birds are ladybugs' main predators, but they also fall victim to frogs , wasps, spiders, and dragonflies.
Ladybugs lay their eggs in clusters or rows on the underside of a leaf, usually where aphids have gathered. Larvae, which vary in shape and color based on species, emerge in a few days. Seven-spotted ladybug larvae are long, black, and spiky-looking with orange or yellow spots. Once the predator, such as a bird, eats its first Ladybug, it experiences a nauseous feeling from the toxins.
Next time it sees the similar brightly colored body of another Ladybug with spots, it remembers what it went through and does not attack. This is a natural phenomenon I wrote previously about, known as Aposematic Coloring. Having said that, there are still plenty of creatures which will hunt and eat Ladybugs. The Ladybug gets its number and color of spots through genes handed down over thousands of generations, mostly evolved even before dinosaurs were on earth, and even some bacteria.
The spots have become one of the main forms of identifying the specific species to which a Ladybug belongs. The above image shows the different species in the Ladybug family. You can see that the color of the body changes from red to yellow and through to orange. The number, shape, and color of the spots on their bodies have changed and evolved gradually from species to species.
As you can also see from the picture, not all Ladybirds have spots. They could also have different markings such as stripes, streaks, and other shapes. The most common type of Ladybug species and the most notorious is the Asian Ladybug, but a popular well liked cute Ladybug is the Coccinella septempunctata.
This type of Ladybug has seven spots on its body. You will find your typical Red Ladybug with its scarlet body and black spots are in this family. Although, this cute and common variety is now seriously under threat from this species! A particular species cannot be predicted just by the number of spots on its body. There could be many sub-species which have the same number of spots.
Many factors such as the sub-species, plus shape, and color of the body helps determine the exact final variety of the Ladybug. The number of spots and their location are decided for a particular species and do not really visibly change over time, but may evolve further and slowly over hundreds, if not thousands of years.
I can tell you Ladybugs are not born with spots, they develop them, but they are predetermined, so the genes already decide what species of Ladybug they are going to be, and therefore they have inherited the spots already. In order to know exactly how the predetermined spots develop, we need to work through the different stages of the life cycle of a Ladybug. The Ladybug starts its life as an egg. It then hatches out of the egg and is called Larva.
Larvae have black and grey bodies. Although the number of spots a Ladybug will have is already pre-determined through genetics, At the Larva stage of the life cycle it does not develop spots, but rather stripes — or markings along its body that indicate what type of spots it will develop later. The spots and other markings do help you identify the species of ladybug.
Some species have no spots at all. The record-holder for most spots is the spot ladybug Subcoccinella punctata , which has 24 spots, of course. Ladybugs aren't always red with black spots, either.
The twice-stabbed ladybug Chilocorus stigma is black with two red spots. So now we know that the number of spots on the back of Ladybugs will help us to identify what species it belongs to. To give an insight into different species of them you can refer to this Identifying Ladybugs. The above image shows different species of Ladybugs where you can see the varying number of spots in each bugs' back. More information can be found here Stripes on Ladybugs. It is because of genes, and is completely inheritable!
First I want point out that there spots, or points, do not change over time. Rather the spot number and location is fixed when Coccinellidae are pupa tween aged insects. You will notice I said Coccinellidae instead of ladybug.
That is because "ladybugs" are actually several different species of insect. Share on Facebook Share. Share on Twitter Tweet. Share on Pinterest Share. Share on LinkedIn Share. Share on Digg Share. Our great reviews and why you should choose us.
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