The Colorado potato beetle was first described in 1824 from the upper Missouri River Valley where it fed on a weed called buffalo bur or sand bur, but when early settlers first began to plant potatoes, the beetles discovered the new food plant and liked it. They have two rows of black spots on either side of the body.
Eggs are orange-yellow in color and laid in clusters on the underside of the leaves.
They may reach large numbers and eat all the foliage from the plant as well as spoil the fruit by eating into it. They are especially destructive to small plantings. Clusters of 20 or more eggs are laid on the underside of the leaves soon after the beetles emerge. The eggs hatch in 7 to 9 days. The larvae feed on the foliage, grow rapidly and complete their development in 18 to 21 days.