The harlequin ladybird is a clever little devil

Wenlock Edge, Shropshire Used to control crop pests, this beetle also has a frightening appetite for other ladybirds and the eggs of butterfliesTricked out in Halloween orange and black, a harlequin moves awkwardly through a micro woodland of moss on the concrete as if it were wandering through an alien world, which in some respects it is. This is Harmonia axyridis succinea, a beetle that began its global travels somewhere in eastern Asia between Kazakhstan and Japan.Because its larva has an ins