Ladybirds in the garden

Ladybird larvae in my garden. These are ferocious predators and great at clearing up the aphids on your plants.

Even though fascinating to watch, this type is not one of our native species. This is the larvae of the harlequin ladybird. It out-competes our native ladybirds when gorging on aphids and will also eat the eggs of our native species while having multiple broods a year making it now the most common species seen in our gardens. They will stay as this larvae stage for upto 6 weeks shedding their skin 3-4 times before attaching itself to a leaf and spending 3 weeks in the pupa stage and finally emerging as an adult.