Ladybird

Another massive response yesterday, this time to my beautiful farmgirl. If only I could show her the wonderful comments, the feelings that you poured onto my journal page, I can just imagine the bewildered look on her face. Easily my most successful 'people' blip with a huge number of hearts. It really was a joy to read your words and I thank you all.

Identification - Anisolemnia dilatata.

I spotted this ladybird climbing a cane stem near the edge of the paddy field. It presented a rare view of the underside, also it was a lot easier to photograph than the top side, it being flat. Because of the bulk of the bug, top side images rely heavily on 'the illusion' of focus, as long as the eyes are good, the rest just falls into place. I covered this discussion a while ago, so I won't linger.

I realize now that this bears a more than passing resemblance to Hillyblips' very clever damsel blip of a couple of days ago, but no plagiarism intended.

I enjoy photographing this ladybird because of its sheer size, at half an inch long. The thing is huge and difficult to believe that it is a humble ladybird (ladybug US). I tried to coax it into flight, but the insect just dropped off the stem, so that was the end of the shoot. I didn't even get the top shot!

Playing dead is a common defense strategy of a lot of bugs, called 'thanatosis'. Most predators will not touch dead bugs and so simply dropping to the ground when under attack, the predator soon loses interest.

As you will likely already know, ladybirds also emit a pungent, objectionable, foul tasting yellow fluid from its joints. This also puts off predators, but often too late. If the bug dies using this defense, it seems strange that the fluid response survived evolution. But, once tasted, the predator will avoid all ladybirds in future and so Darwin's theory of evolution is answered.

Dave