Green Tortoise Beetle Pupa - in my Garden!

Tortoise Beetle peering over the edge of its woundwort leaf

The washing hung out – yay – I was having a wee look at my garden when I noticed some leaves on my hedge woundwort… They had been nibbled into lace! [The title ‘Green Tortoise Beetle Pupa’ kind of gives the game away! If you’re not up for a longer read, you can make an educated guess who the culprit was!]

Nothing has ever even touched my hedge woundwort before, so I was intrigued!

Hedge woundwort

Hedge woundwort [Stachys sylvatica] would probably be described by many gardeners as a ‘weed’. It is certainly relatively obscure as a garden plant. However, whilst it did just arrive of its own accord in my garden – I can’t remember when – I like it just about as much as the bees do! And that’s good enough reason to keep it!

It is characterised by its tall spikes of magenta, marbled, hooded flowers in whorls of 4 or more around the square, hairy stem. It’s best/ worst feature is the smell! The crushed leaves are scented somewhere between rancid trainers and over-ripe armpit!

Once upon a time, the leaves of woundwort were used to heal wounds, funnily enough. You can make a healing salve by gently heating the leaves in oil for a few hours. (Though I dread to think of the permeating smell!)

Other uses have included easing menstrual pain and cramps, as a sedative and to relieve aching joints. I should maybe have picked some while I was crouched down there, in order to aid the journey back up again!

So, I had a wee look underneath some of the leaves, and lo! There was a creature! Something small and bright green, but with a jaggy black margin and a funny looking frill and ‘horn’ at one end. I hadn’t seen anything like it!

The bonus greenfly gives an idea of scale:

It is actually a well camouflaged little thing, looking at the contours compared to the leaf edge.

Identification

After taking a couple of photos (well, lots of photos in the hope that one or two were in focus!), I went to research. Not really knowing where to start looking, and having drawn a blank in trying, I took to my local wildlife group on Facebook. There are several insect-savvy folk on there. My initial thought was that it could be a shield-bug instar, because they are funny looking things too. I’d seen one identified in the group the day before. But nope. Not quite right.

A knowledgeable and confident id a few moments later – Cassida viridis – the green tortoise beetle!

How exciting!

I hadn’t even ever heard of a tortoise beetle before! I was even more excited, as these guru-esque insect folk hadn’t seen the pupa before either!

So I went out and took another few photos!

I’ve looked and searched online but haven’t seen any pupa like these. There are a fair few larvae photos, but no pupa the same as ‘mine’.

I feel very lucky to have looked at the right time and spotted these pupae!

I would also love to see a green tortoise beetle larva – they are very odd looking things too! The ‘fluffy’ off-white bits behind ‘my’ pupae are their discarded larval skins. The larva actually heap their own poo on top of their backs as an additional means of camouflage!

Hedge woundwort is listed as one of the green tortoise beetle larva’s food plants. The only other plants it feeds on are white dead-nettle and water mint. Another reason to keep my (stinky) hedge woundwort!

I kept a beady eye (okay, dodgy eye) on them, and the next morning, one had emerged!

It left its papery case under the leaf.

I was disappointed I hadn’t seen it go, to bid it a fond farewell. But then I turned the leaf back over again, and behold!!

A green tortoise beetle!

Wayhey!
Still new and semi-translucent, you can make out the wings beneath its hard, outer wing covers. These hard forewings protect the hind wings below. I found a cool video showing a tortoise beetle taking off! Shame it wasn’t a green one… Though they aren’t related, it does look quite similar to a ladybird. However its forewings (creating its armoured back) extend well beyond the body of the beetle.

This one stayed on its chosen leaf where it was really pretty well camouflaged.

Protection

The tortoise beetle can retract its legs and antenna and hunker down, so that the hard outer ‘shell’ is flush with the leaf. Predators can’t get underneath! Just like… a tortoise!

Clever!