Yet Another Cycling Forum

Random Musings => Miscellany => Where The Wild Things Are => Topic started by: FatBloke on 08 August, 2010, 04:32:08 pm

Title: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: FatBloke on 08 August, 2010, 04:32:08 pm
The air is thick with them!!  Millions upon millions of little red beetles on the wing. And in the house and on me when I venture outside!!

At least they seem to be the native 7 spot variety and not the invading forrin beetles!
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: Hello, I am Bruce on 09 August, 2010, 11:00:13 am
We have a plague of greenfly, and no ladybirds.

Perhaps we can swap.
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: TimO on 09 August, 2010, 11:03:26 am
I remember getting caught in a similar things years back when I was a kid, on Pendine Sands (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pendine_Sands), which is a huge and exposed area.

I don't really mind Ladybirds in general but that was a bit "Ugg".
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: Feline on 09 August, 2010, 07:31:02 pm
Can't ladybirds bite you?

I saw a few flying around in the Cotswolds too, seemed to be an awful lot of insects around in general. At one point a wasp was sat on my front light, so I had to stop the bike and knock it off with a crisp (it was all I had that was biodegradable!) so it didnt land in my face when I was riding.. a wasp on me is likely to make me crash!
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: itsbruce on 09 August, 2010, 07:54:41 pm
You stopped, opened a crisp packet and then hit the wasp with a crisp? 

Or were you munching crisps as you rode along?
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: clarion on 09 August, 2010, 08:09:29 pm
We have ladybirds with appalling timing round here.  Had a load earlier in the year, which died off, then the blackfly had a party.  Now they're just about done with, and we've had to use a spray (organic), the ladybirds have come back. ::-)
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: woollypigs on 09 August, 2010, 11:21:04 pm
Years ago my mum owned a green, what you would nearly call hi-viz, fiat. One hot summers day we went to the beach but had to bail out and retreat. Since these little buggers were there in there by the millions, never seen that many in one place. We jumped into the car, which were now more orange/black that hi-vis green.  Even before we started the engine and put on the fans, it was a very hot day, they were crawling into the car, like in a horror movie.

The following winter we still had ladybird "flying" out when we turned on the heater in the car.
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: Kim on 10 August, 2010, 12:58:41 am
You stopped, opened a crisp packet and then hit the wasp with a crisp? 

I was wondering about that bit as well.  Assumed it was one of those things that sounds daft but made perfect sense at the time, like murdering a tent-invading earwig with the battery from my mobile phone.

A friend recently discovered that ladybirds can indeed bite, though only because she left one on her arm for ages because she was watching it.  Perhaps they only do it when bored?
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: longers on 15 August, 2010, 07:14:50 pm

A friend recently discovered that ladybirds can indeed bite, though only because she left one on her arm for ages because she was watching it.  Perhaps they only do it when bored?

I found that out a few years ago, I sat and watched it walk up the inside of my arm to my elbow where it sank it's bitey thing into my arm and then flew off. I'm not sure what their bitey thing is called and a quick search hasn't thrown up an answer.

There were lots spotted in Nuneaton last week but not plague proportions.
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: robbo6 on 15 August, 2010, 08:09:44 pm
Bitey things on insects are mandibles.
Title: Re: A plague of ladybirds!!
Post by: longers on 15 August, 2010, 09:19:38 pm
Ta, I think I remember it having a proboscis type arrangement for biting me with. Would there be mandibles on the end of that?