Garden Pests and Diseases: Friend or Foe #2, 1 by Night_Bloom

Night_Bloom wrote:
sebek - I answered your question on the old thread before realizing you also posted your question here, so I, too, am copying my response over here. Here it is...

The insect in your photo above is a four-lined plant bug (family Miridae, Poeciliocapsus lineatus). This is not a good bug. It can cause leaf damage. If the numbers start accumulating, a low-impact control method such as a systemic imidicloprid or a short lasting natural pyrethrin should work.

The problem with your red bug is that the behaviour sounds like that of a wheel bug nymph - see this picture here... http://www.ipmimages.org/browse/detail.cfm?imgnum=1430015 or a closely related assassin bug. But nymphs of the plant bug are also red in color. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture to link to for the plant bug nymph. I'd probably need a picture to tell which you have. The shape of a Reduviidae (wheel type bug) would be quite a bit different than that of the Miridae (plant bug), but I couldn't say which you have from just the description you have here. Though the size is pretty large for a plant bug, so I'd more go for the wheel bug - see the adult picture I posted in the first post. Wheel bugs are great predator bugs. They especially like to eat caterpillars.

margu - in general, no, most moths won't be flitting around in the daytime. At least not the moths that we have here. In some other countries there are "day flying moths", but I don't think we have any here. The closest we have are the hummingbird moths - there are some nice pictures of these in the butterfly and hummingbird thread - and they mostly fly at dusk and they don't really flutter, but fly pretty fast.

Some of the distinctions between butterflies and moths aren't definite, but here are some generalities.

At rest, butterflies usually put their wings behind their back, folded together. Moths don't do this. (Similar to damselfies which rest with their wongs folded and dragonflies which rest with their wings outstretched.)

Moths generally have a fat, often fuzzy or hairy body. Butterflies are usually slimmer and not hairy.

Male moths often have bushy antennae, butterflies not.

Butterflies are usually active in the daytime whereas moths mostly come out at night.

Of course then there are the skippers (family Hesperiidae) which sort of fall in between the moths and butterflies. They are active in the day and have a "fatter" body. They can either rest with their wings open, or in a "half-open" position. Generally their distinguishing character is an antennae with a little "scoop" at the end and generally large eyes, though if you see a critter with their wings in the typical half-open position, you can be pretty sure that you have a skipper.

Here are some pictures of skippers. The first one shows the typical "half-open" wing position. Note the big eyes, head, and body. Also note the scooped end of the antennae.


This message was edited May 16, 2005 4:45 AM