An Asian Invasion?

There is a lot of talk at the moment about the invasion of the Harlequin Asian ladybirds into the UK and how they're edging out our native species. We have a pretty healthy population of ladybirds in the garden so I thought this year I would take a shot of each one I see and compile a list.

It'll be interesting to see how many UK vs Harlequin we have.
The first two are:
This fella is a Harmonia axyridis which is yep, a Harlequin.

and yep, you've guessed it this is Harmonia axyridis conspicua – another variant of the Harlequin.

Not looking good for the UK fellas. So 2-0 to Asia so far.

New entrant as of 24 July 2010.
Harmonia axyridis... Asia 3 UK 0.

The guys over at Harlequin Survey are recording all sightings of Harlequin ladybirds over the UK. So if you do see one it would be great to let them know. They have an online form which is really easy to fill out and you can even upload your pictures and they'll email you to confirm your identification.

Hats off to the Ladybirds

These little troopers are without doubt the best thing we've bought for the garden this year. Ladybird larvae. I'd never seen them before, they're quite interesting looking things, they've got spikes running all up and down them and they look like they're made out of rubber.

We had what can only be described as a swarm of greenfly, they were literally smothering the garden. We'd read about using ladybirds to combat greenfly and we were pretty desperate, none of the organic sprays had really done much so we ordered some larvae from here.

http://www.organiccatalogue.com/catalog/product_info.php?products_id=1192

I must admit, it was very strange getting bugs in the post. It turned a few heads in the office! Anyway, home they came and they made inroads immediately. Apparently they can eat up to 100 greenfly a day. Within about two weeks the greenfly were well and truly under control and now we're pretty much aphid free, a few colonies here and there but nothing the plants can't handle.

These guys grew big! They were gorging themselves. When they first turned up they were probably about a 1mm long on average, some of them must have got to nearly 2cm. About two weeks ago they started to turn into adults, almost simultaneously which was a little strange, here's a shot of them mid-flow.
They almost concertina themselves up, we couldn't quite work out how the red bits on the larvae in the top picture turn into the red bits here but nevertheless it was all very interesting to watch. We hope they stick around, we've got a ladybird house so maybe they'll make themselves comfortable and keep on top of the greenfly.

Either way, we'll be definitely getting some more of the troopers next year. Hats off to the ladybirds—they rock!