ladybird

leppäpirkko, leppäkerttu Any of the Coccinellidae family of beetles, typically having a round shape and red or yellow spotted elytron elytra.
1914, Entomological Society of America, Annals of the Entomological Society of America, Volume 7, http://books.google.com.au/books?id=conyAAAAMAAJ&q=%22ladybird%22 %22ladybirds%22|%22lady+bird|birds%22+-intitle:%22ladybird|ladybirds%22+-inauthor:%22ladybird%22&dq=%22ladybird%22|%22ladybirds%22|%22lady+bird|birds%22+-intitle:%22ladybird|ladybirds%22+-inauthor:%22ladybird%22&hl=en&sa=X&ei=SvybT7v3NumsiAf61bTYDg&redir_esc=y page 81,

During this time, they eat about 825 Toxoptera per ladybird, making an average of about twenty-five per day to each ladybird.

Lady-bird, lady-bird, fly away home, / Thy house is on fire, thy children all gone: / All but one whose name is Ann, / And she crept under the pudding-pan.

Ladybirds, unlike most beetles, enjoy considerable popularity: they are attractive to look at and are well-known as useful predators of aphids—the greenfly and blackfly that destroy garden plants and crops.

Perhaps it was a sense of lack of effectiveness of native ladybirds in rapid and complete control of aphid infestations that led to attempts to import additional aphid-feeding ladybird species into North America.