''Adalia decempunctata'', the ten-spotted ladybird or ten-spotted lady beetle, is a carnivorous

beetle Beetles are insects that form the order Coleoptera (), in the superorder Endopterygota. Their front pair of wings are hardened into wing-cases, elytra, distinguishing them from most other insects. The Coleoptera, with about 400,000 describ ...

of the family Coccinellidae. The ten-spotted ladybird was one of the many species originally described by

Carl Linnaeus Carl Linnaeus (; 23 May 1707 – 10 January 1778), also known after his Nobility#Ennoblement, ennoblement in 1761 as Carl von Linné#Blunt, Blunt (2004), p. 171. (), was a Swedish botanist, zoologist, taxonomist, and physician who formalise ...

in his 18th-century work, '' Systema Naturae'', its original name was ''Coccinella decempunctata''. Its specific name from the

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

''decem'' "ten", and ''punctata'' "spotted".

Varietas

Varietas include: * ''Adalia decempunctata var. lutea '' (Rossi) * ''Adalia decempunctata var. quattuorpunctata'' (Linnaeus) * ''Adalia decempunctata var. octopunctata'' Müller * ''Adalia decempunctata var. lateripunctata'' Gradl. * ''Adalia decempunctata var. humeralis'' Schaller * ''Adalia decempunctata var. guttatopunctata'' (Linnaeus) * ''Adalia decempunctata var. decempustulata '' (Linnaeus) * ''Adalia decempunctata var. bipustulata'' Herbst

Distribution

''Adalia decempunctata'' is a common Palearctic species found in

Europe Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a subcontinent of Eurasia and it is located entirel ...

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

, European Russia, the

Caucasus The Caucasus () or Caucasia (), is a region between the Black Sea and the Caspian Sea, mainly comprising Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia (country), Georgia, and parts of Southern Russia. The Caucasus Mountains, including the Greater Caucasus range ...

Siberia Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...

Belarus Belarus,, , ; alternatively and formerly known as Byelorussia (from Russian ). officially the Republic of Belarus,; rus, Республика Беларусь, Respublika Belarus. is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by ...

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

Moldova Moldova ( , ; ), officially the Republic of Moldova ( ro, Republica Moldova), is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The unrecognised state of Transnistr ...

Transcaucasia The South Caucasus, also known as Transcaucasia or the Transcaucasus, is a geographical region on the border of Eastern Europe and Western Asia, straddling the southern Caucasus Mountains. The South Caucasus roughly corresponds to modern Arme ...

and western Asia.

Description

''Adalia decempunctata'' can reach a body length of about . This species is highly variable. Individuals may in fact have a red, orange or brown ground colour and between 0 and 12 distinct dark elytral spots, although rarely more spots have been recorded, up to 15 spots. These beetles have a glabrous body, with an almost round form. Legs and antennae are usually brown or orange. The species includes eight varietas, with three basic forms. The light form shows five to seven black spots on the pronotum and several black spots on the red-orange elytra. The dark form is mainly black or brown in color, and the pronotum has a light border on the sides and front. The mixed form has black or brown in color elytra, each with five orange to red spots. Sometimes these ladybirds have no spots at all.

Biology

It occurs in

western European broadleaf forests The Western European broadleaf forests is an ecoregion in Western Europe, and parts of the Alps. It comprises temperate broadleaf and mixed forests, that cover large areas of France, Germany and the Czech Republic and more moderately sized parts ...

eastern deciduous forests,

Sarmatic mixed forests The Sarmatic mixed forests constitute an ecoregion within the temperate broadleaf and mixed forests biome, according to the World Wide Fund for Nature classification (ecoregion PA0436). The term comes from the word "Sarmatia". Distribution This e ...

, at forest edges, and in parks and gardens wastelands and in Eurasian Steppe, Pannonian Steppe biotopes. It is found on bushes and deciduous trees, on grasses, under bark, in moss on trees, in leaf litter, on brushwood,

coarse woody debris Coarse woody debris (CWD) or coarse woody habitat (CWH) refers to fallen dead trees and the remains of large branches on the ground in forests and in rivers or wetlands.Keddy, P.A. 2010. Wetland Ecology: Principles and Conservation (2nd edition). C ...

and in alluvial soil. The insects feed on

aphid Aphids are small sap-sucking insects and members of the superfamily Aphidoidea. Common names include greenfly and blackfly, although individuals within a species can vary widely in color. The group includes the fluffy white woolly aphids. A t ...

s on trees and bushes.Savoiskaya, G. I., Coccinellid Larvae (Coleoptera, Coccinellidae) of the Fauna of the USSR (Nauka, Leningrad Branch, Leningrad, 1983) (''Keys to the Fauna of the USSR'', Published by the Zoological Institute of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR, No. 137) n Russian The adults overwinter in litter and among fallen leaves.

Gallery

File:Adalia decempunctata (10-spot ladybird) - f. decempunctata - Flickr - S. Rae (3).jpg, ''Adalia decempunctata decempunctata'' File: 10-spot ladybird (Adalia decempunctata) Cumnor.jpg, ''Adalia decempunctata var. bipustulata'' File:10-spot ladybird (RL) (26753783571).jpg, ''Adalia decempunctata var. octopunctata'' File:10-spot Ladybird. Adalia 10-punctata - Flickr - gailhampshire.jpg, ''Adalia decempunctata var. guttatopunctata'' File:Adalia decempunctata (2007-03-31).jpg, Dark variant File:Adalia decempunctata (2007-03-11).jpg, Unusual form File: Coccinellidae - Adalia decempunctata.JPG, Unusual form File:Adalia decempunctata 19.JPG, Unusual form

References

Beetles of Europe Beetles described in 1758 Coccinellidae Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus {{Coccinellidae-stub