Predatory stink bugs reared from eggs – I’m calling them “Webworm destroyers”
On July 7, 2013, Sandy found this clutch of eggs on a branch of a spruce tree in the yard. They were in the process of hatching out tiny stink bugs.
Now, this is hardly the first time we’ve found stink bug eggs, but on previous occasions I found that it is surprisingly difficult to get an ID on the eggs and nymphs. So, this time I decided to try rearing them to adulthood to see what we got.
The eggs looked like they were laid by one of the predatory stink bugs in the subfamily Asopinae, so I tried feeding the hatchlings small caterpillars. This was what they wanted to eat, and they grew rapidly. They looked like this after a week:
And looked like this, with more pronouced white stripes, after about two weeks:
By this time, they were looking pretty familiar. We had seen virtually identical nymphs raiding tent caterpillar nests in the spring, and fall webworm nests later in the summer.
And then, after a month, they matured to – these!
It wasn’t quite what I was expecting, but given all we know about its diet and what its nymphs looked like, it is finally identifiable.
It is Podisus placidus, a very common predatory stinkbug. These are a northern species (of course), and are apparently found across Canada and the northern tier of US states.
This species evidently doesn’t have a common name. Although, considering how many of them we’ve been finding around the place, they probably should have one. I propose “Webworm Destroyers”, because that’s mostly what we’ve been finding them doing.
And, given that these went from egg to presumably-mature adult in just about a month, they most likely have several generations per year. Which means that, the next time we get a tent caterpillar plague[1], these bugs are probably going to breed like crazy to keep up, and have their own population explosion.
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[1] It has been 14 years since our last big tent caterpillar population explosion, and the Forest Service says that we should expect one every 15 to 17 years. The clock is ticking . . . I wonder if there is some way that we can encourage these stink bugs in advance, so that they will be ready when the tent caterpillars come?
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