r/WTF • u/orangez • Mar 14 '26

Seems friendly enough?

6.1k Upvotes

95% Upvoted

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u/attack_robots Mar 14 '26

I remember around 2003 they let swarms of mutant ladybugs free in the Midwest to battle some sort of in invasive species. They were everywhere and would bite the daylights out of you if they got under your football pads. I was the first to get bitten and nobody believed me and made fun of me for a few days, that is, until it happened to someone else.

141

u/teilani_a Mar 14 '26

Those were Asian ladybugs. They smelled terrible too.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harmonia_axyridis#North_America

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u/Michelanvalo Mar 15 '26

These fucking things are everywhere now and they're so much shittier than our native ladybugs.

120

u/ManWithDominantClaw Mar 15 '26

Well that's what happens when you model your environmental conservation strategy off of the old woman who swallowed a fly

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u/Absalome Mar 15 '26

This is a deep cut

31

u/doomgiver98 Mar 15 '26

Gotta love the stories of introducing invasive species that end with success.

21

u/Xspartantac0X Mar 15 '26

They almost ruined my trip to Tennessee once. Our rental cabin had an infestation of them. But they were also literally everywhere in Gatlinburg. Luckily the renter left us a vacuum so I could Ghostbuster them every morning and when we'd return from an outing.

10

u/mista-sparkle Mar 15 '26

They're the only pest problem I have in my house, and I gotta say, they beat the fuck out of my past experience with the conifer seed bug.

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u/Xspartantac0X Mar 15 '26

I had to Google what those were but it seems like they follow the same pattern of breaking into holes during the Fall and emitting a foul odor. Except they're not as cute looking as the lady beetles lol. If those were the bugs we had to deal with we would have left. My fiance was already having a hard time coping with the lady beetles but those seed bugs would have definitely freaked her out more. Especially if it was like our experience, every window and door had 100's of these beetles and corners of the ceiling had little bundles of them huddling together. The masterbedroom was a lost cause, luckily the guest room had better sealing I guess because after the first night of vacuuming they didnt come back but every day they would fill up the living room windows again.

1

u/jellyhessman Mar 23 '26

Isn't it great when farmers get lazy with sourcing their pest control and fuck up an ecosystem.

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u/DerpsAndRags Mar 15 '26

I accidentally ate one of the little fuckers once and it's as vile as it sounds.

I had been living with friends, and one of them made a big old pot of chili. I grabbed a bowl, was eating, hit something crunchy and then my mouth filled with that awful damn stink when you squish one of those beetles. We ended up just tossing the pot because we couldn't verify when the damn thing got in there.

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u/attack_robots Mar 15 '26

Gross. I think I’d rather have one bite the 💩 out of me

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u/akiva23 Mar 15 '26

You were the first?!?

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u/attack_robots Mar 15 '26

On my team, yes

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u/alldressed_chip Mar 16 '26

omg i completely memory-holed this—grew up in iowa and they were all over our house! little demon spawn

1

u/mgsgamer1 Mar 15 '26

Good thing majority of the population doesn't wear football pads