Lady beetle - Hippodamia quinquesignata

Hippodamia quinquesignata punctulata

this species the one in your image was formerly known as
Hippodamia.quinquesignata.punctulata. when I was a kid in elementery and Junior high
in Los Angeles during the 50's and early 60's this species was
very common often more numerous than Hippidamia convergens I haven't
seen it in the los angeles basin since the early 1980's I thought
it was extirpated in my area since unlike H.convegens, H.quinquesignata
does not hibernate or estivate in the mountains but instead it does this
in the breeding grounds but these habitats are destroyed by development
and competition from exotic lady beetles such as Harmonia axyridis doesnot help either.H.convergens is still common however.

… Michael Martinez, 26 February, 2010 - 7:09pm

Moved

Moved from Ladybird Beetles.

… Harsi S. Parker, 11 July, 2009 - 10:30pm

can be fun -- Tim Moyer will tell

head color pattern peculiar, too

… v belov, 11 July, 2009 - 9:28am

Hippodamia,

but after that it becomes less "fun". Several of these large Hippodamia appear very similar and are often externally inseparable. Fortunately, I believe we can determine this one as H. quinquesignata ambigua LeConte.

H. q. ambigua exhibits the pale area on the lateral pronotum often confined to the apical corner, elytra "almost always" immaculate, with or without convergent spots (I think I see tiny dots on this one), and confined to the west coast, west of the Sierra / Cascade mountains. These characteristics found combined, rule out the other possibilities (whew!)

The pale diamond on the head of this one does look unusual (to me). But I believe this is a probably a female, as I see not even a thin pale line on the apical pronotum. The others currently in the Guide appear to be males. LeConte's two types at the MCZ, H. ambigua, and a synonym, H. punctulata (which MCZ incorrectly lists under convergens), also both appear to be males (Gordon states ambigua is a female, but given the head and apical pronotum I wonder if this is a mistake), but they all still appear to show signs of this diamond, along with aditional pale area between the eyes.

Another "unusual" (and fun) west coast ladybird, and another new (sub)species for BugGuide :)

… Tim Moyer, 11 July, 2009 - 10:08pm

Thank you

Hoo-wee! It even comes with a trinomial!

… R. Berg, 11 July, 2009 - 11:06pm