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| The (clipped) insect on the left seems to be Deraeocoris ruber, a member of the Miridae family |
We went to explore the walled garden at Thornham Magna in Suffolk last Saturday. Unfortunately the garden was not open, but we enjoyed exploring the woodland paths that surround it. The place was teeming with insect life ... dragonflies, butterflies, crane flies ... and Ladybirds.
Sadly most of the Ladybirds were Harlequins, like the one above. I am not sure whose pupa you can see below. I think it is a Ladybird one, but I need to buy the ID card on Ladybird Larvae (Brown et al) to be sure.
Who knows, perhaps we will be able to venture through that door-in-the-wall on our next visit!
The Ladybirds you see below are 7-spots, a native British species.
David counted 79 Harlequins. Our four 7-spots were drastically out-numbered
Do keep a look out for Ladybirds and log them on the UK Ladybird Survey. There is a new recording form, which links in to the iRecord site* which you can click on to from here, so if you have an iRecord ID, do log in to that first.
* I wasn't able to sign out of iRecord easily, so have not given you the direct link, but the site is only two clicks away and worth investigating.
