Tasmanian ladybird
Cleobora mellyi
The Tasmanian ladybird is an orange or yellow ladybird with a black pattern and black bands across its back. It is quite big for a ladybird. It is the only species in its group, so it has no close cousins.
Lives in
Tasmania and southern mainland Australia, and now New Zealand too
Length
5.5 to 9 mm (0.22 to 0.35 in)
Can it hurt you?
Harmless
Harmless. It does not bite or sting and is safe to watch.
What does it eat?
It hunts small insects. People hoped it would eat a beetle that munches the leaves of gum trees.
How big is it?
How long is it?
💅small enough to sit on your fingernail🍚as long as 1.5 grains of rice in a row⚽could fly across a whole football pitch in 10 seconds⚡moves 1100 times its own body length every second
How big is Tasmanian ladybird compared to YOU?
Just maths in your browser. Nothing is saved or sent anywhere.
How fast is it?
A kid running fast about 13 km/h (8.1 mph)
A grown-up on a bike about 25 km/h (16 mph)
Tasmanian ladybird about 37 km/h (23 mph)
A car driving in town about 50 km/h (31 mph)
cool stuff
Fun facts
1
In 1977 people took it to New Zealand to fight a beetle that eats gum tree leaves. It only partly worked.
2
Its head is yellow or orange with black marks.
3
It comes from Tasmania and the southern parts of mainland Australia.
you asked
Most asked questions about Tasmanian ladybird
?How big is the Tasmanian ladybird?
It is about 5.5 to 9 millimetres long, which is big for a ladybird.
?Is the Tasmanian ladybird dangerous?
No. It is a harmless ladybird.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Cleobora mellyi
- Group
- Ladybirds
- Family
- Coccinellidae
- Classification
- Insecta > Coleoptera > Coccinellidae
- Lives on
- Australia and Oceania
- Also known as
- Southern ladybird
Where the facts come from
- Cleobora (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Fir0002 at en.wikipedia. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The sticker of this bug is drawn from this picture.
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