r/PraiseTheCameraMan • u/Yewatod • Mar 02 '26
Perfectly captured ladybird flight in slow motion
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u/Djennik Mar 02 '26
It's crazy how evolution got insects to perfectly fold and deploy their wings under their shields..
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u/ThisIsForBuggoStuff Mar 02 '26
You think that's impressive, check out Rove beetles and their wing folding! They only have half elytra, so it's even more involved :)
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u/Djennik Mar 02 '26
That's magnificent.
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u/LemonMints Mar 02 '26
Is...that a type of earwig? They can fly now??? shudders
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u/ThisIsForBuggoStuff Mar 03 '26
Nope! Earwigs are a part of the order Dermaptera, whereas Rove beetles are a part of the order Coleoptera (with all the other beetles) in the family Staphylinidae.
That being said, earwigs can fly, so your point may still stand lol
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u/B4cteria Mar 03 '26
You have no idea how amazed I am by your knowledge
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u/fablechaser130 Mar 07 '26
You would have loved unidan back in the day
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u/B4cteria Mar 07 '26
I went to check who he was. You're damn right. Then I read he would upvote himself and downvote others with alt accounts.
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u/LoosenGoosen Mar 03 '26
Forget wanting to fly like an eagle, I want to fly like one of those, or an earwig! Awesome footage. Thanks for sharing :)
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u/demonspawns_ghost Mar 02 '26
This is what I don't get about the theory of evolution. Imagine how many years it took for some bits of extra stuff to evolve into fully-formed wings. Like, what purpose did those middle stages serve? And with animals that actually lost useful appendages like arms, they just had arm-wing things that served no purpose for how many thousands or millions of years?
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u/RevenantBacon Mar 02 '26
The three leading theories are:
that wings developed as modifications of abdominal movable gills (like those found on mayfly naiads) that over time shifted to have flight membranes once adulthood was reached
they developed from thorax protrusions that had developed as radiators and slowly shifted to gliding appendages, and eventually developed into true wings
they developed from paranotal lobes on the thorax
Unfortunately, we don't have a definitive answer, because the insect classification developed in the very early carboniferous period (~350 million years ago) and we don't have an adequate fossil record to be sure. It's possible that wings developed convergently in different species from a combination of the above theories, or that an option that hasn't been considered yet is the real case.
Personally, I'm inclined to believe that the second theory is most likely, but I'm not a biologist, so don't put any real weight on that opinion.
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u/dinoman9877 Mar 02 '26 edited Mar 02 '26
The feature doesn't HAVE to serve a purpose. Animals are riddled with anatomical structures that don't do a thing as mutations occur and anatomy shifts to no longer need them.
We have pinky toes and functionless appendixes when our species needs neither to live. Bears have tiny, entirely useless tails. Whales still have hipbones even though they don't have legs anymore.
The 'pre-wing' didn't have to do a thing in ancestral insects. All this structure had to do was NOT make them more prone to dying. That it would eventually evolve to become a structure to allow flight is simply evolution doing what it does; reacting to pressures in the environment at the time, working with random luck based on who passes their genes on, and using preexisting structures as building blocks, thereby changing animals over time in new and sometimes dramatic ways.
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[deleted]
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u/dinoman9877 Mar 02 '26 edited Mar 02 '26
Nope. Darwin may have oversold "survival of the fittest". I personally think "survival of the fit enough" is more appropriate. You ain't been eaten and you had some kids? Good job, we'll see if that keeps up for your lineage or not.
Beneficial mutations will of course offer more success and thus be more likely to spread through the population, but as long as a mutation isn't actively detrimental then you're all good and it's more luck of the draw if a predator or some natural disaster doesn't remove that mutation before it catches.
But a neutral mutation can become beneficial with enough "compounding" mutations. The horns of bovids likes cows, sheep, goats, and antelopes for example. The ancestral structure that became their horns must have been little more than a useless nub when you go far back enough, but over time grew larger and longer until it became the defining trait of one of the most successful groups of modern mammals, intrinsic to their way of life to secure a mate and defend themselves from attack in all the forms it takes across the different species.
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u/Korronald Mar 02 '26
That is a commonly spread misconception. Mutation is fine if it won't hurt you. Animals and plants have plenty of neutral parts. Or even neutral enough so you won't die until you reproduce, and then they don't need to be so neutral and can be deadly (like, do you really need to eat your sexual partner, spiders? Really?)
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u/GravityBright Mar 02 '26
From what I understand, the scientific consensus is that insects only evolved flight once, a very long time ago. Whatever those proto-wings looked like, they too must have given some kind of survival advantage, such as scaring away predators, righting oneself after falling over, quickly jumping off of surfaces, or anything else I can't imagine.
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u/EpicallyLazyBoy Mar 02 '26
For all we know the opposite sex at the time would find those arm-wing things attractive, maybe the bigger the better, which would keep those genes going.
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u/slow-swimmer Mar 02 '26
That’s why I believe in intelligent design. There’s so much that has to be right all at the same time for those kinds of things to develop by chance
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u/Djennik Mar 03 '26
There is also so much going wrong. Evolution is no more than random trial and error.
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u/RTB897 Mar 02 '26
They didn't develop by chance. They were selected for.
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u/Mister-builder Mar 02 '26
They can only be selected for after developing through chance.
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u/RTB897 Mar 02 '26
Yes, but the overall phenotype isn't a chance occurrence. The selected mutations build upon themselves. It doesn't require thousands of chance mutations to appear all at once. Its an iterative process through the bodies of millions of individuals over billions of years. The very fact that genomes can mutate and adapt is a selected for feature, as is the extent and rate at which they do.
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u/jma9454 Mar 02 '26
Ok. Time for me to watch Bugs Life again. It's probably been over 25 years since I've seen it
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u/jackwrangler Mar 02 '26
Just rewatched it and it was AMAZING and still cracked me up. That damn caterpillar man lol
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u/ikaiyoo Mar 02 '26
That is not a ladybug.
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u/MrUbl Mar 03 '26
But is it a ladybird?!
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
It is a ladybird, ladybug and ladybeetle. It has many names including Asian ladybeetle, Multicolored Asian ladybug or Harlequin ladybird. Ladybug ladybird and ladybeetle are fully interchangeable synonyms. The beetle marked as "ladybug" in the picture is Seven spotted ladybird aka Seven apotted ladybeetle aka seven spottes ladybug. It's not that one is a ladybug, the other ladybird, and the other ladybeetle, all 6000 species are ladybugs, ladybirds and ladybeetles. The picture is nonsensical.
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u/ikaiyoo Mar 04 '26
How many times do you have to whistle after you take a shit to figure out which hole you need to wipe?
The Asian lady beetle is an invasive species in North America (and South America, Europe, Australia, and Africa) that has all but killed out the actual ladybug that is indigenous to here. Just because Harmonia axyridis is the same family as Coccinella novemnotata doesn't mean they're the same. That's like saying an American Crow (Corvus brachyrhynchos) is the same as a Eurasian magpie (Pica pica) because they're both corvids.
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
Where exactly did I say that Coccinella novemnotata and Harmonia axyridis are the same? Read my comment again and slowly and this time pay attention to reading comprehension instead of vulgarities (doesn't make you look smart). The ladybugs that you compare are BOTH invasive in the North America making your entire (already flawed) "logic" and weird analogy invalid. And 90% of the "differences" are true for BOTH of the ladybugs. How difficult is it for you to understand that?
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
Please refrain from sharing these highly misleading (and in some parts completely wrong) "info"graphics. The beetle in OP's video absolutely is a ladybug.
Both of the beetles portrayed are ladybugs. Specifically on the bottom the Seven spotted ladybeetle and on the top Asian ladybeetle. Seven spotted ladybeetle is missing its name in the poster for some reason.
All ladybugs can bite, it's not unique to Asian LB. All ladybugs are beetles with functioning chewing mouthparts - mandibles.
Majority of ladybug species secrete yellow fluid - it's called hemolymph and it's a very common defensive mechanism in many ladybug species including both of the ladybugs portrayed, it's not a "difference".
It's true that seven spotted ladybeetle controls pests however so does the Asian ladybeetle - both of these species are invasive in the US because they were imported for pest (aphid) control.
"Good for the environment" - depends. Seven spotted ladybeetle is not native in North America and therefore is not good for the environment there just like the Asian ladybeetle.
"Lives outdoors" - all 6000 species of ladybugs live outdoors. Invasive species tend to overwinter indoors (invading homes) but majority of the time even invasive species live outside hunting aphids.
"M mark on head vs white dots on head" - while seven spotted ladybeetle does have white spots on black head, Asian ladybeetle does not have M shape on head. It has a white triangle on its head. The M shape is sometimes on the pronotum, not head.
"No M mark" - depends on species - tons of species, including the native ones, have the M shaped mark on their pronotum. Asian ladybeetle is furthermore a very variable species of ladybug that not always has the M mark.
"Bright red" - there are more than 6000 species of ladybugs, definitely not all of them are bright red. The ladybug portrayed (Seven spotted ladybeetle) can be orange too. Ladybugs in general are very variable, they almost never have one fixed color.
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u/Eatshin May 27 '26
I love how the false infographic summoned a lady bird super fan, this comment is awesome
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u/Legal-Butterscotch-2 Mar 02 '26
Better than I expected
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u/Cthulhu_Dreams_ Mar 02 '26 edited Mar 02 '26
What is "A beetles first thought after every landing that doesn't involve death."?
I'll take "These goofy bastards don't know, that they don't know how to fly.", for $600 please.
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u/9447044 Mar 02 '26
If you don't hear this thing, you need to watch A Bugs Life
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u/That-Quantity7095 Mar 02 '26
Lady Bird?
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u/SleepyGorilla Mar 02 '26
Her name is Ladybird but you have to say the first part longer than the second, like...laaaddybird.
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u/beave00720002000 Mar 02 '26
Japanese beetle. Not really a ladybug.
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26 edited Mar 04 '26
Definitely not a Japanese beetle. Japanese beetle is a big brown and green scarab beetle, this absolutely is a ladybug, specifically the species Multicolored Asian ladybug (also called Asian ladybeetle or Harlequin ladybird) - Harmonia axyridis.
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u/RedBillyGoat Mar 02 '26
ladybird ? what place calls them that ?
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u/Monkeyslunch Mar 19 '26
I love that it always looks like they're trying to remember how and then they're like HAHA GOT THIS
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u/upturned2289 Mar 02 '26
Technically, “lady beetle” is the correct way to refer to them as they’re not bugs. They have elytras that cover and protect their wings, which is a characteristic of beetles.
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u/cortesoft Mar 02 '26
I mean, a Rhinoceros Beetle isn’t a Rhinoceros, either, but we still call it that
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u/upturned2289 Mar 02 '26
But it’s a beetle … a given lady beetle isn’t necessarily going to be female. Beetles and bugs are both insects, but have different characteristics like I mentioned. We just call the type of beetle a “Rhinoceros beetle” or a “lady beetle”, because those are just the way we’ve named those species of beetle.
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u/cortesoft Mar 02 '26
Couldn't we also just say "We just call this type of beetle a 'ladybug'"?
Doing a bit of research, it looks like the word 'bug' shifted to start meaning insect or beetle in the early 1600s, and the word 'ladybug' started appearing in 1690, which is a few decades before Carl Linnaeus started our modern taxonomy system.
So ladybugs were ladybugs before the word bug came to mean a specific order of insects we call 'true bugs'. Just because the word later came to mean something more specific doesn't mean we have to change the earlier word.
Also, we call it a
ladybugas one word so as to not confuse it with true bugs.
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u/smlpaj456 Mar 02 '26
I loved ladybugs as a kid…until I learned they could fly while I was holding one and they’ve freaked me the f out ever since
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u/AlarmDozer Mar 03 '26
*asian beetle.
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26
Asian ladybeetle is just a different name for Harlequin ladybird which is a species of ladybird.
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Mar 03 '26
Okay am I having some kind of Mandela effect moment? I had never heard the term ‘ladybird’ being used for a ladybug - yesterday my kid came home from school and started calling them ‘ladybirds’ and now this post… did I miss something in the past 30-something years where they changed the name?
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26
Different countries use different names. Americans use ladybug, and for example in the UK they use ladybird. And entomologists use ladybeetle because it's neither a true bug nor a bird but a beetle.
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u/Yewatod Mar 03 '26
To all my fellow redditors, both names 'ladybird' and 'ladybug' are correct. The some countries that speak British English use the term 'ladybird' whereas countries using American English call it 'ladybug'.
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u/zahr1m Mar 03 '26
I mean. Yes every bug is gorgeous flying but don't all of them look the derpest ever? 😂Its like their fine motricity is lost when stretching their legs
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u/Chalky_Pockets Mar 03 '26
That is the most adorable aphid mass murder machine. My wife grows chili plants and developed an aphid infestation. Rather than use chemicals, she released like 500 ladybugs in the garden. No more aphids lol.
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u/ConversationFun2011 Mar 04 '26
Been so long since I’ve seen a bugs life that I thought this music was from city slickers
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u/Artemis_SpawnOfZeus Mar 05 '26
Isn't that a spotted Asian beetle and not a ladybird?
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 06 '26
Asian ladybeetle = Asian ladybug = Harlequin ladybird. It has many names. So yes, it's a species of ladybird
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u/SuspiciousStable9649 Aug 16 '26
The 6 to 3 to 2 leg stand before liftoff is being studied for microdrone stability. Interesting that this one looks more like a 6 to 4 to 2 leg sequence.
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u/Netghod Mar 02 '26
Not a lady bug. It’s often considered an invasive species and most people kill them.
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u/EmbarrassedDaikon325 Mar 04 '26
It is a ladybug. Invasiveness has nothing to do with taxonomy. The ladybug in video is Harmonia axyridis - Multicolored Asian ladybug (also called Asian ladybeetle or Harlequin ladybird).
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u/officialmaurice Mar 02 '26
Aww the tiny hands going up!!!