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Good Bugs Versus Bad Bugs
Good Bugs vs. Bad Bugs
There are good bugs and there are bad bugs. This is a fact. All bugs serve a purpose in one form or another. Some of them can be quite beneficial to you, especially if you garden. Today, we are going to cover some bugs that look similar, but serve different purposes in our lives. The Good Bugs can be symbiotic, while the bad bugs may become a risk or a nuisance.
Braconid Wasps vs. Whitefly
At first blush, the wasps sound worse than the whiteflies, but in reality, the wasps are helping you out. Female Braconid Wasps can lay up to 200 eggs a day and they usually lay their eggs either on or in soft caterpillars. This means that they kill the little guys that like to tear up your vegetable garden. These wasps don’t have stingers and they usually leave humans alone. So, let them kill your garden pests for you.
Whiteflies, however, are small white winged bugs that suck the moisture out of your ornamental plants, trees, shrubs, bushes, and even grass. These insects usually travel in large numbers and can be easily seen. They look like very small solid white moths and can be spotted on the underside of your plants. The white shapes may look similar to the Braconid Wasp’s egg sacs on caterpillars, but they are much more detrimental to your yard.
Lady Bugs vs. Asian Lady Beetle
Everybody remembers playing with a Lady Bug at one point or another. They are a brightly colored beetle that is a popular Halloween costume for young girls year after year. Lady Bugs are great to have in your garden because they eat a bunch of bad bugs. Aphids and Mites are among their favorite snacks and that can help your plants live longer.
Asian Lady Beetles, on the other hand, are imposters. These beetles look like Lady Bugs, but they are nowhere near as beneficial to your yard. While Lady Bugs eat garden pests, Asian Lady Beetles like to bite people and pets. They aren’t poisonous, but their bite is said to be painful and they are known to bite the inside of a dog’s mouth and hang on. If your pet is foaming at the mouth and acting tired, check the roof of their mouths. These little guys might be causing trouble.
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Contact UsGreen Lacewings vs. Mayflies
Green Lacewings are a beautiful friend to your garden. Much like Lady Bugs, Green Lacewings eat Aphids and Mealybugs. They also eat those pesky Whiteflies from the first bugs we talked about. These flying insects don’t bite people and don’t really cause any havoc. Just enjoy looking at their artful wings in your garden.
Mayflies aren’t particularly dangerous. They don’t bite, they aren’t poisonous, and they are a cousin of the dragonfly. They are, however, a nuisance. Mayfly swarms can get so thick that they can be picked up on weather radar. You may have seen them buzzing around the lights in outdoor stadiums, porch lights, street lights, or dock lights. They can swarm so thick that it can get dangerous to drive, but that’s about the extent of the dangers from this bug.
Spiders vs. Spiders
The biggest benefit of spiders is that they eat bugs. They eat other spiders, mosquitos, flies, aphids, dragonflies, butterflies, pretty much any insect that lands in their webs can become dinner. It can be a good thing to have spiders in your garden to keep bad bugs at bay because they don’t eat plants, so they won’t damage your greenery.
Black widows, brown widows, wolf spiders, and brown recluse are all dangerous spider species in southern Louisiana. These spiders are poisonous or venomous and will cause you problems if you are bit by any of them. These spider bites can be very painful and require immediate medical attention. Some spiders are mostly harmless, some not so much.
We have to live with good bugs and bad bugs alike. It’s important that you learn the differences between dangerous bugs and harmless bugs in your area specifically. Just because you see an insect doesn’t mean something is terribly wrong. Likewise, just because a bug looks pretty doesn’t mean it won’t cause any damage. If you see strange insects and want to learn more, do some research or just call Skeeter Force. We’ll help you FIGHT THE BITE.
