BAD BUGS have definitely arrived in Macclesfield - with some of the first Silk Town sightings reported to the Macclesfield Express.
Last week we warned that an aggressive mutant version of Britain's beloved ladybird - the harlequin - was thought to be heading this way and since then, five callers have rung in with reports of sightings.
The predator, which has a black 'M' naturally branded behind its head, gorges on the common varieties of the spotted species and could wipe them out in the next ten years.
Expert Peter Brown, said: "It's scary how quickly they are spreading. I have found one previous verified harlequin ladybird record in Macclesfield in October so these are the first reported sightings since then."
First to spot the creepy crawler was grandmother-of-two, Lynda O'Brien, who found one in the kitchen of Prestbury Road's West Park Museum.
She kept it under a cup in case it started eating the Egyptology exhibits.
She said: "I could tell it wasn't a normal one because it had at least 20 spots and was orange. I read about it in the Express and knew what to look for."
The harlequin originates in Asia, where it was used as a bio-control agent to eat insects and stop them destroying crops.
The first British spotting was in the summer of 2004 in Essex, but it has since been seen in Wales and Cheshire. The unfriendly flyer landed near gardener David Todd, who was mowing the grass at Whirley Hall.
David, 45, said: "I was down by the fields at the bottom of the garden when I looked down and there was a ladybird on the top of the grass box of my mower.
"I looked down and could immediately see it was unusual, with more spots than usual, and it was an orangey colour."
Helen Higgins, 57, saw the 17-spotted bug in a bathroom at the Moor Hayes Hotel, on Manchester Road, Tytherington.
She said: "It definitely looked different, with more spots and a yellowish colour. We love ladybirds here and it's awful to think they might be wiped out by this nasty new kind."
