Exploring Lady Bug Mobility

Phylum: Arthropods

Class: Insecta

Order: Coleoptera

Family: Coleoptera
Genus: Coccinellidae.

Species: Lady beetle

The appearance of a lady bug is as follows. The adult is oval, convex, and brightly colored. The head is small and turned downward. They are nearly hemispherical in shape, like one half of a pea. They have short legs, and the convergent Ladybug has 6 black spots on each wing.

The lady bug has a few defense mechanisms. It will often fall to the ground and “play dead”. They also can secrete an amber bad tasting fluid from the joints in their legs.

The markings and coloring of a ladybug change as it evolves. The eggs of a lady bug are yellow. The larvae are black with small orange or white markings. The pupa is orange and black. The adult is again yellow.

The food and habitat of a ladybug is fascinating. They eat only aphids, and other plant eating insects, such as scales and mites. They live on plants inhabited by aphids, such as roses, and oleander. In the winter, they hibernate in large groups.

The predators of ladybugs include lacewing larvae, and birds. But birds can only attempt to eat lady bugs, because of their defensive bad taste.

Our Mobility Experiment

Purpose: To see if lady bugs can be trained to race.

Hypothesis: I think that ladybugs can not be trained to race because their memory capacity doesn’t seem to be that big.

Procedure and materials: Make a race track out of paper. Lay the paper flat, and fold it to create an open sided triangular prism. Put the lady bug inside the track, then start counting. If the lady bug happens to move up onto the side of the track, with a flick of your finger move it back down to its designated area. Give your ladybug a trial of ten times.

Results:

Experiment #	Time in Seconds
1	26
2	15
3	12
4	8
5	19
6	23
7	20
8	10
9	28
10	14

Conclusion: Ladybugs have some idea of what they are doing, but they still are not the racing type of animals, therefore they can be trained to race somewhat.