Ladybug

It was a beautiful day of late spring. The birds sang their songs and the sun sent her first warm beams of light over the fields surrounding Bahrins Rest. Orin walked through his fields and made sure his crops were all well. They had already had grown strong small plants. This year would see a good harvest.
As he continued further, a ladybug landed on the ear directly next to him...

Basic Information

Anatomy & Morphology

The ladybug is a small rounded bug with a black head and red wings with seven black dots on it. Like all bugs, it has 6 legs and a chitinous exoskeleton. Its size is usually around 5 to 8mm in length. To the naked eye, males specimen look exactly like female ones, but a closer inspection reveals tiny hair on the bottom side of the bug.

Geographic Distribution

The ladybug can be found in most areas with a temperate climate, such as Trigon, Elrion, Sinstrade, Mignor, Eluviras and Illubardor. The cold climate of Arendir, as well as the hot climate of the Desert Island or Dragon's Island, does not suit their biological cycle, making them only a very rare sight in coastal regions.

Biological Cycle

During the summer, the ladybugs main activity is looking for food, eating, and sleeping. Its primary food sources are lice and similar smaller vermin. Therefore, they typically congregate around fields befallen by such pests. When a particularly good food source has been found, the mating season begins. Afterwards, each female will lay up to 400 small eggs directly onto plants with lice, so the young have food once they hatch.
When winter is near, the ladybugs gather in large colonies of hundreds of animals at protected places beneath moss, grass or fallen leaves to hibernate. The outmost bugs often freeze to death or otherwise don't survive winter, while the ones at the centre have very good chances of surviving. It is assumed that these outer positions are intuitively taken by older and weaker individuals, who thereby sacrifice themselves to protect the others. In spring, the survivors leave their hideout, rendering the grave of the rest of the colony openly visible.

Cultural Perception

The ladybug is seen as an omen bad luck by the rural population of Terenus. This mostly stems from the fact that they have exactly seven black dots and seven is seen as an unlucky number because there are exactly seven evil gods. While seeing one or two bugs is only a minor reason for concern, seeing many is an extremely bad omen foretelling a varmin pest and a rough winter. That superstition is reinforced by the fact that the bright red winge of the ladybug are usually noticed before the lice in the field which results in an inversion of causality: It is believed that the ladybugs attract the lice, not the other way around.
Finding a colony of dead ladybugs in the spring, however, is considered a good omen. It is seen as a symbol of the victory of the good over the evil that is said to repeat every winter, especially during the Seven Dreaded Nights at the turn of the year. In this instance, it is incorporated by the obviously slain minions of the Seven: the ladybug.

Winter was coming. Orin looked at the corn in his granary. This would not be sufficient to get through to the next year. Most of the crops had been befallen by lice and eventually died.
Darn those ladybugs!

Coccinella 7-punctata by James K. Lindsey

Scientific Name

Coccinella septempunctata

Lifespan

up to 3 years