Nature and Gardening

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All things green, outdoors, and nature-y. Whether it's animals in their natural habitat, hiking trails and mountains, or planting a little garden for yourself (and everything in between), you can talk about it here.

See also our Environment community, which is focused on weather, climate, climate change, and stuff like that.

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Ladybug lures (self.greenspace)

submitted 1 year ago by espy to c/[email protected]

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I've been considering buying ladybugs to release in my patio to help with plant pests (mostly aphids). But I can imagine them all just flying away. So I was wondering if any of you have tried "ladybug lures" and if they work at all? They seem to be pheromone based and it sounds promising.

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[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago

You are right that they will just fly away, usually just after 1 day of hanging around.
But it's really not good to purchase ladybugs anyway. They're not raised in an insectary, they are taken from their native homes. Also, their immune systems are hyper-localized so when the purchased ladybugs inevitably fly away, they breed with the local populations and end up weakening the immune systems of the subsequent generations.

I've never tried a "ladybug lure" but you can attract them yourself by planting native, or at least localized, flowering plants.

You can however purchase green lacewing larva from insectaries or their distributors. The lacewing larva are known as "aphid lions" and they certainly live up to their name. A cheaper option, although a bit slower, is to purchase assassin bug eggs. They come on little paper cards that you hang on your plants and will hatch after a week or so.