Bordered Plant Bug

Seconding the comment about these bugs being in GA. Found one in my Marietta, GA garden today.

First time I've ever seen one.

Found two of these bugs today in my newly built Athens, GA, raised garden bed, near a wooded area with mostly pines. Pine straw mulch around the beds. This is my first spring here, so I don't know if they were here before. They looked very fat, and I disposed of them.

Add Oregon to your list, please. We are in the Central OR coast, and I've seen them a LOT in Mapleton and Deadwood. Last year saw definite damage to beans, and I'm seeing them on raspberries now.

For the second year in a row, this bug's population (near Redding, CA) is literally exploding in mid-summer. They go after a lot of things, but damage to tomatoes has been my biggest complaint. A few days before a tomato is ready to pick, they find it. Unchecked, hundreds of the tiny larvae or a dozen adults may cover a single tomato. Of course, it's ruined.
For 2 weeks now, I've been dusting the area around the base of the plants with a healthy dose of diatomaceous earth. It seems to help. Their numbers inside the "perimeter" have declined. I can't find proof it's killing any of them, but if it's just a deterrent, I'm fine with that.

We live in South East Queensland, Australia, and we have a bug which I am unable to identify (can't find how to ask a question on Dave's Garden) but it looks very much like the Bordered Plant Bug from the USA. It is about 12 mm long, 6 legs, with an orange body, brown wings with about 25% of the wings darker near the tips forming a sort of shield. They have two quite long feelers. We have millions of them in our house roof, gutters, etc. They sometimes drop to the ground when threatened and play dead for a few seconds before trying to escape. Can anyone help me? We have been spraying them with household insecticides.

We are studying this bug in IPM class. Can cause dimpled top of fruit (as pear, from early season sucking), tiny white spots on top of tomatoes. That may be acceptable for home garden but not if you're marketing. Also can suck out, flatten the cells of berries, and I think they make berries taste bad that they've crawled over. I have always had them here but suffcient predators that they don't seem to be a serious problem . Will clean up my veg garden more thoroughly for the winter, however, to help stop overwintering. Yes, the little shiny black bugs running around are juvenile forms. (Also has a red or metallic blue stage for some forms.)

This bug is infesting the property that I live on! It has not (that I've seen) damaged my veggie garden, but it does eat the various fruit on the property (apple and plum). They are in large numbers here, they crawl all over everything, I see them on the walls of my hay barn, garage, house, the garden, the trees, shrubs, etc. I just now found out what they are called, and that the little black one is the nymph - and all this time I thought they were two different species! We recently had a large tree fall for reason's unknown - so I was concerned when I saw them starting to appear in large numbers from the beginning of August onward. My knowledge of bugs is quite infinitesimal .... so I am still not sure if this is a "bad" bug, or a "helpful" bug .... is there way to thin their population ... read moreout? We do have a large bird population, but I don't know if they eat them or not.

I have bordered plant bugs in my organic vegetable garden. I live in the hills west of the city of Sonoma, CA at 900 foot elevation. They are mating now. I do not see anything unusual as far as plant damage. My pears and pit fruit are just starting to have 1 inch fruit on them. What do I do to control the bug?

I have this insect in my garden and it has destroyed much of my garden. They have eaten corn, tomato, squash and just about anything else. I put a couple blue berries in pots that had blueberries and they ate the fruit. There are thousands and I don't know how to get rid of them. The nymphs and adults are sucking everything. I need help.

These bugs are everywhere in my yard and my neighborhood. I could not identify them because I was trying to identify the nymph, which was what I was seeing. I also added pictures of the nymph.

I emailed an entomologist in my state and he sent me this information:

"These are nymphs of the Largus Bug, Largus succinctus. They are also sometimes referred to as 'bordered plant bugs' because of the orange margin that the adults have around the outside of their back. They are common in MS, especially in areas with lots of pine trees. They feed on various weeds, but I have never seen them damage any ornamental or food plants. I am not sure why they are associated with pines; they do not seem to damage them."

Blake Layton, Ph.D.
Extension Ento... read moremology Specialist

These bugs are about 1/2 inch (14-17 mm) long, steel blue in color, and have reddish-yellowish markings.

Largus succinctus (L.), like other true bugs, has sucking mouth parts. Being general feeders, they suck juices from a variety of plants such as oak, wax-myrtle and other woodland foliage and sometimes from weeds. Generally, they cause little damage to the plants upon which they feed. However, in the fall they leave their host plants and seek cracks and crevices in which to spend the winter. They also mate and disperse. Large numbers of these bugs in the landscape can cause some concern.

Description: Both families (Largidae and Pyrrhocoridae) of these bugs are similar in appearance and habits. The largus bug, Largus succinctus (Linnaeus) (Largidae), is about... read more 1/2-inch long, elongated oval and flattened, steel blue in color, and have reddish-yellowish markings around margins of the shield behind the head (pronotum) and abdomen. The outer margins of the pronotum are rounded.

Habitat, Food Source(s), Damage: Nymphs and adults have sucking mouthparts. Although largus bugs are general feeders, sucking juices from a variety of plants such as oak, wax myrtle and other woodland foliage or, occasionally, weeds, they generally cause little injury to plants upon which they feed.
Largus bugs generally cause little injury to plants upon which they feed. However, in the fall nymphs and adults leave their host plants and seek cracks and crevices in which to spend the winter. They can be common around the home during the fall, crawling randomly around the ground. Cotton stainer nymphs (second and third instars) feed together (gregariously) on cotton bolls while that last stage and adults wander freely over the plant. On long-staple cotton varieties, cotton stainers injure developing bolls by puncturing the seeds and causing plant sap to exude from the feeding sites, resulting in yellow-stained lint and poorly developed bolls.

Pest Status: Largus bugs are seed feeders, occasionally a nuisance when in high numbers around the home; cotton stainers, or "red bugs", occasionally damage long-staple cotton; both are medically harmless.