What summer is all about, no? Bugs.
I've seen the first japanese beetle of the season, but I was pleased to see a crab spider had snagged it before I found it. Already dead! Woohoo! Go, garden, go!
But still, there is always some bug or another. The mosquitoes, the deerflies, the pretty little white cabbage butterflies...
And yesterday, these guys:
They were just hatching out of their golden eggs, on the back side of a pelagorium leaf. (That's a zonal geranium to most of you... why we can bounce names around for the chrysanthemum/ leucanthemum but can't call a pelagorium a pelagorium is beyond my simple understanding... )
They immediately went into quarantine.
Today they looked like this:
I've got an email in to the bug masters... I can only hope that the good folks at What's That Bug will find my photos worthy and will post an answer to my query.
I don't want to be too quick about these things. They may be aphids. But they may be assassin bugs, or wheel bugs, or any number of predator bugs that will munch on my aphids and make my garden a better place.
And while they go to work, I can sit back on the porch and watch the lightening bugs.
Yeah, that's the life.
Psst - that's pelargonium...
Love the name of the garden, by the way! Hogglebog...
Posted by: Janet | June 27, 2006 at 06:24 PM
The Japanese Beetles have just arrived in my garden, lots of handpicking and if the rain clears up I'll put out a pheramone baited trap tomorrow. These spikey bugs you have are interesting to look at, hope they're something benign.
Posted by: steven | June 27, 2006 at 11:39 PM
Jenn,
Your critter is the larval stage of some bug... I see ladybug larvae all the time, eating aphids, but you critter's antennae are too long for a ladybug, I think.
Don
Posted by: Don | June 28, 2006 at 09:25 AM
Its a leaf-footed bug nymph.
They are evil on tomatoes, other fruits and pecans.
Don't know how they are with anything else.
Here's a site with some good pictures:
http://www.cirrusimage.com/bugs_leaf_footed.htm
Posted by: Amy | June 28, 2006 at 09:44 AM
Ah HA! Thank you, Amy.
As I am growing lots of tomatoes this year, these guys are toast.
Too bad, as they are kind of cute, in a hedgehog sort of way...
Posted by: jenn | June 28, 2006 at 09:50 AM
Fascinating bugs and now that you have an identity for them it makes them even more interesting. Yes, cute "in a hedgehog sort of way..." and I see why they will be "toast"!
Posted by: Judith | June 29, 2006 at 10:40 AM
Eek...I cringe just looking at those things! I know I have to toughen up about these things...but, yikes, those guys are creepy!
Posted by: elizabethgardens | June 29, 2006 at 04:31 PM
For future reference: Bug Guide! You may know this already.
I've been drowning lots of Japanese Beetles around here lately.
Posted by: Rurality | June 30, 2006 at 12:16 PM
Yep.
Bug guide is great, but I was useing their search and entering 'red nymph' and all I was getting were aphids and assassin bugs. No leaf footed buggies...
So, the indexing is a bit tricky.
Posted by: jenn | June 30, 2006 at 12:40 PM
Those are some wild looking insects!
Posted by: Nelumbo | July 13, 2006 at 11:43 PM