Seven-spotted ladybug

This species, the most common breed of ladybug in Europe, is officially named the
Coccinella septempunctata, or commonly named the seven-spotted ladybug or C7. Five
American states honor the C7 as its official insect.
Compared to other ladybugs, the adult C7 is large. They range in length from seven to
eight millimeters. It fights predation by secreting a foul-tasting fluid. Ladybugs lay multiple eggs
at a time. Larvae emerge from hatched eggs and after a few days will begin molting. Ladybug
larvae enter to the pupal stage, during which they rest on a leaf for a few days and metamorphose
into adult ladybugs. The period from birth to adulthood is generally three or four weeks. The
average C7 lives for one year, but a lucky one will make it to two.
Seven-spotted ladybugs can live anywhere where there exist both plants and aphids.
Thus, they are found in temperate, terrestrial, savanna, chaparral, and forest ecosystems. The
Coccinellidae family is believed to have originated in western Europe. The country with the most
ladybugs is England.
Animal prey includes various small insects that ruin plants, especially the aphid. Just one
can eat fifty aphids daily. The C7s voracious appetite for aphids has led to massive introductions
to North America as a biological pesticide. The first American population was established in
New Jersey in 1973 as a result of an introduction. C7s have since spread throughout the United
States. The ladybug is perhaps the most commonly used biological pesticide. Folklore says that
during a serious pest infestation in the Middle Ages farmers prayed to the Virgin Mary for help
and in turn received the ladybug. In the 1800s the citrus industry in California faced trouble
when pests destroyed whole groves of trees at a time. Ladybugs were released into the affected
areas and the insects were gone in the space of two years. Since then, gardeners and farmers
alike have bought ladybugs and released them into their plots to get rid of destructive aphids and
similar pests. Since aphids feed on a variety of plants, ladybugs are beneficial to that many crops.
Aphids destroy cereal grains both by eating them and infesting them with the barley yellow
dwarf virus.
The disadvantage to raising ladybugs is bringing the correct conditions in nature to the
home. Domesticated ladybugs actually must be tended to very carefully. Also, biological controls
actually need a certain level of pests to survive and chemical pesticides are cheaper and more
readily available. The bugs loyalty to the plot of land is unpredictable; they can easily fly away.
Most purchased commercially are trapped in their natural habitats rather than raised on a ladybug
farm, so they run the risk of introducing viruses to their new environments. Thats why its so
important to keep them satisfied as far as food supply goes, even though you theoretically dont
want the food supply to exist.
Despite these struggles, the use of C7s over pesticides is ultimately more practical. Pests
will adapt to predators much more slowly than they will to a chemically-inflicted illness.
Ladybugs are natural and will not poison the plants along with the pests. Ladybug will only
affect the foliage on the land, not the air and water.

http://animaldiversity.ummz.umich.edu/accounts/Coccinella_septempunctata/
http://bugguide.net/node/view/3543