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Friday, June 27, 2014

Star Washers in the Vineyard: The Spined Soldier Beetle

There are still about an acre's worth of vines in our vineyard that we need to take care of and we are still in the process of weed wacking and removing rocks. We're about two-thirds of the way through this process. A few evenings ago, when my husband and I were working side by side he shouted to me to come over to where he was working. So, turning off the Husqvarna wheeled trimmer, I made my way over to where my husband was. He pointed to a pencil rod to show me what he had found. We saw the adult form of this insect earlier in the year and we recognized these shiny metallic things as the eggs of the spined soldier beetle. We saw these eggs last year and destroyed them without knowing that these were eggs of a beneficial insect so this year we were more careful. I took the artistic liberty of rotating the photo of the eggs on the pencil rod:
Just before we began weed wacking, at the start of one of the rows was another cluster of these eggs and some of the nymphs had hatched!
I emailed Pamm Cooper at the UConn Home and Garden Education Center and asked if we had identified these eggs correctly and she wrote back, "The eggs have a look similar to an external star washer, unlike most stink bug eggs which are barrel- like." What do you think?
Pretty cool!
For a really good article on the lifecycle and why the spined soldier beetle is beneficial, please refer to this link: University of Florida Featured Creatures: Spined Soldier Bug

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