Garden Pests and Diseases: Friend or Foe?, 1 by Night_Bloom

Night_Bloom wrote:
I'm glad you remembered, margu, because I wouldn't have thought of a Jerusalem cricket. We don't have those critters here in Georgia. We have another burrowing cricket called a mole cricket - but lucky for you I don't have a picture of one of those. They are smaller than your "potato bugs" but no less ugly.


sebeck - I can't be positive, but I think that this might be your little critter. This was a one of a group of baby grasshoppers that sat on these wildflowers for a few days. They never seemed to eat very much, and they will be very small grasshoppers when they are fully grown.

It might also be a small predatory bug (that picture will follow), but the grasshopper is more likely from what I can see. Since it is so small, all by itself, and doesn't seem to be doing any harm, I would tend to let it be for now. I try not to spray my flowers at all, since I don't want to harm any visiting butterflies or bees. That can be tough (my poor Rudbekia took a beating last year), but it does generally make for very inetersting pictures to have all the bugs visiting - hee.