Stereotypical Ladybug Behavior (Well-Nigh Wordless Wednesday)

You always hear about ladybugs eating aphids, but I’ll be honest: I’ve watched thousands of ladybugs, and I’ve never actually seen one eat an aphid.  Until, that is, I got this photo of a seven-spotted ladybug eating an oleander aphid on common milkweed recently:

Ladybug eating an aphid

Woo!  A ladybug doing what everyone always talks about them doing!  It was an exciting moment for me for some reason.  :)

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Unless otherwise stated, all text, images, and video are copyright © C. L. Goforth.

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2 thoughts on “Stereotypical Ladybug Behavior (Well-Nigh Wordless Wednesday)

  1. Is it possible that only the Seven Spotted Ladybug eats aphids, and most of the time you’ve been looking at the other non-native ladybugs?

    • Don’t think so! Many species of ladybugs are documented eating aphids, so not just this one. I just don’t spend lots of time watching them on the plants. I tend to either collect them temporarily to document them for citizen science projects or just snap a photo and move on, so I’m not surprised I don’t see this behavior.

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