This is the last of the harlequin beetle photos. I finally had to evict them from the garden. The yellow beetle in this photo has recently shed his black and red skin. He’ll be yellow for a few hours then he’ll return to normal harlequin colors.
Yes, more bugs (and eggs).
Little harlequin beetles clustered around the eggs they emerged from. As a gardener, I really shouldn’t encourage this sort of thing, but I can’t help but be fascinated by these little bugs and their bulls-eye eggs: http://365project.org/skelly10/365/2013-04-29
Last month I posted a photo of a harlequin beetle in my garden. Since then, several of those beetles have moved in, so I let them have a broccoli rabe plant in order to keep them out of the rest of the garden. A few days ago I noticed eggs on the plant… quite a bunch actually. I suppose I’ll have to destroy these since I don’t want the garden overrun by stink beetles, but they are so very interesting looking. They’re also quite tiny; I’ve placed them on a US penny here for size reference.
More photos at Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/skelly10/sets/72157607142398738
I found two very flashy bugs in the garden today tapping a rapini plant. I figured they were probably pests rather than beneficial insects since they were brazenly helping themselves to plant juice, but I thought I should try to find out some more information about them before sending out an eviction notice.
I don’t remember ever seeing this insect here before, but after finding out it is partial to mustard plants, I know why it’s here now – rapini is in the mustard family.
I also found out that the harlequin beetle is a stink bug. Eew.
