Description
Harmonia axyridis is a "typical" coccinellid beetle in shape and structure, being domed and having a "smooth" transition between its elytra (wing coverings), pronotum and head. It occurs in three main color forms: red or orange with black spots (known as form succinea); black with four red spots (form spectabilis); and black with two red spots (form conspicua). However, numerous intermediate and divergent forms have also been recorded. The beetle is typically large for a coccinellid (7–8 mm long) and even more dome-shaped than native European species. These characteristics distinguish H. axyridis from native species in the UK.
A useful informal clue for distinguishing this species from most other Coccinellidae is that the pronotum of most colour forms of Harmonia axyridis have white markings that typically define an "M"-shaped black area, as seen on a beetle resting head-upwards (or "W"-shaped if it is head-down). Usually they also have brown or reddish legs.
Read more about this topic: Harmonia Axyridis
Famous quotes containing the word description:
“To give an accurate description of what has never occurred is not merely the proper occupation of the historian, but the inalienable privilege of any man of parts and culture.”
—Oscar Wilde (1854–1900)
“As they are not seen on their way down the streams, it is thought by fishermen that they never return, but waste away and die, clinging to rocks and stumps of trees for an indefinite period; a tragic feature in the scenery of the river bottoms worthy to be remembered with Shakespeare’s description of the sea-floor.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“The Sage of Toronto ... spent several decades marveling at the numerous freedoms created by a “global village” instantly and effortlessly accessible to all. Villages, unlike towns, have always been ruled by conformism, isolation, petty surveillance, boredom and repetitive malicious gossip about the same families. Which is a precise enough description of the global spectacle’s present vulgarity.”
—Guy Debord (b. 1931)