The day before I took this photo was pretty warm and sunny, with millions of the bugs climbing all over the branches. - See photos 66 A & 66B. That night it got very cold and snowed. I was curious to see how my little bug friends were doing. I suspected that they would have all crawled back down into the pine matt for protection, but I was wrong. They had spent the night still on the branches they had been on the day before. This is what I found. As the day warmed up, some of them came back to life and began crawling around,. But the cold did kill many of them
Every fall as the temperature drops and the aphid populations disappear, the lady bugs have little food to eat. They fly to the lower mountains where they apparently eat pollens and nectar. They hibernate for the winter in the foothills under pine matts or oak leaves to avoid the freezing air that would kill them. This species is called the Convergent Lady Bug. There are many other species, some are not even red. The red color serves to keep preditors away since it warns them of the foul tasting chemical which comes from their leg joints. Whenever the warm and sunny days arrive, masses of these little gems climb out on branches to get warm.
Every fall as the temperature drops and the aphid populations disappear, the lady bugs have little food to eat. They fly to the lower mountains where they apparently eat pollens and nectar. They hibernate for the winter in the foothills under pine matts or oak leaves to avoid the freezing air that would kill them. This species is called the Convergent Lady Bug. There are many other species, some are not even red. The red color serves to keep preditors away since it warns them of the foul tasting chemical which comes from their leg joints. Whenever the warm and sunny days arrive, masses of these little gems climb out on branches to get warm.