Getting attacked

[Jac@stafford.net]

Biting ladybugs? Never heard of that one.

They are Asian lady beetles, not your lady bug.

[bobwysiwyg]

Asian Lady beetles! Those are the ones that bite. Last year I stepped into a field and once set up I was swarmed! Very unpleasant, and when I got back into the truck there were some inside the camera bag. I'd rather encounter black bears. Seriously, our black bears are less threatening here than farm dogs.

Ditto, a pox on whomever brought them here! It's getting colder now and they will invade any structure they can in an attempt to stay warm.

[Drew Wiley]

Ha Jack. They're even parenthetically termed "ladybugs" on official Ag sites. No farmer I've know ever called them "lady beetles". Nor any professional entomologist, and I've known more than my fair share of them too. In fact, if these thing bite, I doubt anyone will use the term "lady" much longer either! Or maybe that just depends on one's personal experience with ladies in general. Except for more white on the thorax (yes, I do have a field biology degree), they outwardly resemble our most common lady/non-lady beetle/bugs (Coleoptera, not Hemiptera, if you must be nitpicky!), but I've never seen our various cute species out here invade houses or bite anything other than smaller insects they consider food. Has someone been watching too many "B" horror movies like "The
Fly"? Sure hope those things don't migrate west.

[j.e.simmons]

I was standing in a Florida swamp, camera pointed at the subject, waiting for the sun to move and give me axis lighting, feet slowly sinking into the bog. I heard something walking through the brush, then saw a hairy back. When the animal came into a clearing, I saw it was a wild hog - tusks gleaming. I had my darkcloth over my shoulders, so I crouched down, then jumped up and threw the darkcloth upwards. I must have looked like a 10-foot tall Sasquatch, because the pig took off bounding through the swamp.

[TrentM]

I can attest, ladybugs do indeed bite! It's not like a bee sting, but it still is not pleasant. More like a pinch.

[Drew Wiley]

Gosh, what unladylike behavior! None has ever bitten me; maybe ladies like me. But I take pigs more seriously. I once set up a closeup shot of a magnificent huge
manzanita trunk with peeling bark when I started hearing grunts. I looked out from under the corner of the darkcloth and found myself surrounded by about thirty pigs, including four full-grown wild boars, tusks n' all. They apparently couldn't figure out what I was, with three wooden legs and two denim ones. So they were grunting back and forth at one another with apparently curious intonation. I VERY carefully pulled the darkcloth and tripped the shutter, put the holder back in, all while keeping the other hand on a tree branch, so I could climb fast if necessary. Then their grunt tone started changing and I knew I needed to act. So I just started whooping real loud. This totally confused their military communication. So they started to panic and run around me fast in a big circle, then suddenly all ran off downhill in the same direction. The shot and resulting Ciba print came out great. Ever better, I wasn't gored and eaten by pigs.

[Jac@stafford.net]

Ha Jack. They're even parenthetically termed "ladybugs" on official Ag sites. [...] I've never seen our various cute species out here invade houses or bite anything other than smaller insects they consider food.

We must be talking about different species. Come to SE Minnesota some spring and live the experience, or if you taste bad, witness other people being bitten. Or visit in late October and see them invade buildings.

[TrentM]

That's a wild story, Drew. Love it! Yea, Florida razorbacks are not to be reckoned with...

[TrentM]

The bugs I'm talking about are the cute little orange beetles with the black dots. I was working on a video production and opened a bag of thousands of them in a garden. The little buggers crawled up my arms, by the hundreds. I was covered with them...and then they started to bite. Ouch! I flung my arms around to make them fly away. The camera crew got a good laugh, but remember, they are carnivores!

[Drew Wiley]

They are carnivores indeed; but the dozen of so species around here can't bit hard enough to pinch the skin. Not all are dotted; the most abundant species is, the
same as farmers are now deliberately releasing into organic fields. But if the lil' critters you are describing are really all that bad, we can end this whole "lady beetle" versus "ladybug" nomenclature debate by simply renaming them "bitch insects".