Identification
Myzia oblongoguttata is brown or chestnut coloured with cream stripes and spots (see first picture below). The pronotum is similarly coloured (sometimes darker) with a large white patch anterolaterally on each side (see second picture below). The head of Myzia oblongoguttata is black with a cream patch between the eyes.
Third image above copyright Gilles San Martin under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.0 Generic license.
Fourth instar larvae of Myzia oblongoguttata (see third picture above) have an orange patch at the front of the pronotum. Most of the body tubercles are black but there is a pair of conspicuous orange dorsolateral tubercles on the first abdominal segment, and orange ventro-lateral tubercles on abdominal segments one, four and six.
Biological control & Distribution
Myzia oblongoguttata mainly occurs in coniferous and mixed forest, but can also be found in birch forest. They feed on aphids, especially species in the genus Cinara. Cinara aphids are usually ant-attended, so striped ladybirds have evolved to be more tolerant of ant attacks than most coccinellids - albeit not as ant tolerant as Coccinella magnifica, which is a true myrmecophile. Myzia oblongoguttata overwinter under loose bark and in ground litter. Striped ladybirds are involved to a greater or lesser in the natural control of Cinara aphids, but have not as far as we know been used for augmentative biological control. The species is distributed throughout the Palaearctic zone.
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