We all want our gardens to stay healthy and that is not always easy. Here is a list of Top 10 Bad guys and I do hope it will help your gardening efforts!

Top 10 Bad Insects for Your Garden:

Aphids

Aphids - Small, soft bodied bugs, colours vary from pink and green to black. They feed on sap in shoots, leaves,buds and flowers, which causes distortion and cupping – watch for honeydew secretions.

Birch Leaf Miner

Birch Leaf Miners – Flat looking larvae adult sawfly is small and black. Larvaes feed on the inside of foliage, which turns the leaves brown. The host of these are birch trees.

Colorado Potato Beetle

Colorado Potato Beetle – Redish orange and black larvae, yellowish, orange and black striped beetles that feed on potato, tomato and eggplants. They stripped the foliage right down to the leaf veins.

Crucifer Flea Beetle

Crucifer Flea Beetle – Adult beetle is metallic blue-black and will feed on leaves, leaving shot-hole appearance.  Likes cole crops and other crucifers, radishes and turnips.

Gypsy Moth

Gypsy Moth – Black, brown and red larvae that feeds on roots – it will defoliate trees

Japanese Beetle

Japanese Beetle – White, C-shaped larvae grubs, metallic green and copper beetle.Larvae feeds on roots, adults feed on foliage and flowers. Likes tuftgrass roots and many, many others.

Spider Mites

Spider Mite – Microscopic – colour vary from yellow to tan to green. Feeds on leaf sap- watch for speckling or bronze leaf colour.

Red Lilly Leaf Beetle

Red Lilly Leaf Beetle – Orange-brown to black larvae covered in excrement; adult beetle is bright red. Larvaes do the most damage by defoliating plants. Likes lilies, fritillaries, some nightshade species, tobacco plants and others.

Scale Insect

Scale Insects – Soft bodied with waxy covering in white, brown or grey. Large colonies of microscopic crawler young feed on sap.

Spruce Budworm

Spruce Budworm – Light to dark brown larvae cause defoliation and likes spruce and other conifers.

These were the bad guys that can cause you problem in your garden. There are a number of ways to get rid of them – one of the best is to make sure you also have the good guys visiting you.

For the Top 10 Good Insects for Your Garden check out:

http://www.mama-knows.com/gardening-tips/top-10-good-insects-for-your-garden.html

One of the best ways to control pests in your garden is to encourage their natural enemies. Planting pollen and nectar plants, and providing protection for these beneficial insects, is a basic tenet of organic gardening, and a way to further increase the ecological diversity of your yard. I have listed the most common beneficial insects along with tips on attracting them to your yard.

Top 10 Good Insects in Your Garden:

Ladybugs

Ladybugs. The familiar round, orange spotted ladybug is just one of more than 400 species of lady beetles found in North America. Most ladybug adults and larvae feed on aphids and other soft-bodied insects. Adults are attracted to flower nectar and pollen, which they must eat before they can reproduce.

Lacewings

Lacewings. Pale green or brown lacewing adults have distinctive large, veined wings and feed mainly on flower nectar. Lacewing larvae, however, are voracious predators that feed on aphids, thrips, scales, moth eggs, small caterpillars and mites.

Hover Flies

Hover Flies, aka flower flies or syrphid flies. Adults look like small bees with striped abdomens; the grayish or greenish slug- like larvae have pointed heads. Flower flies are attracted to flowers to feed on nectar and pollen. The larvae feed on aphids in tight places where other good bugs can’t go, and are especially helpful in early spring, before other beneficial insects are active. Flower flies also pollinate strawberries and raspberries, producing larger fruits and higher yields.

Predatory Bugs

Predatory Bugs, including minute pirate bugs, ambush bugs and assassin bugs (soldier bugs, big-eyed bugs). These bugs prey on many insects, including tomato hornworms, thrips, spider mites, many insects’ eggs, leafhopper nymphs, corn earworms and other small caterpillars. Pirate bugs are attracted by willows, buckwheat, corn and nectar and pollen from many flowers. Predatory bugs are attracted to bunch grasses, shrubs and other permanent plantings that provide them shelter. A unique lure is available to attract emerging soldier bugs to gardens.

Ground beetles

Ground beetles. Large, long-legged, shiny blue-black or brown beetles that hide under rocks and logs during the day, and are fast-moving when disturbed. They feed on slugs, snails, cutworms, root maggots, and Colorado potato beetle larvae. Attract them by providing perennial ground covers, stones, or logs. Rove beetles resemble earwigs without pincers, and feed on many insect pests and like similar conditions to ground beetles.

Parasitic Wasps

Hunting and parasitic wasps. There are hundreds of species of wasps, including many that are so tiny you can barely see them. These mini-wasps often attack the eggs of pests, and are one of the most important insect groups that provide control of garden pests. They can be attracted by growing by pollen and nectar plants.

Spiders

Spiders. All spiders feed on insects and are very important in preventing pest outbreaks. The spiders normally found in gardens do not move indoors, nor are they poisonous. Permanent perennial plantings and straw mulches will provide shelter and dramatically increase spider populations in vegetable gardens.

Tachini Flies

Tachinid Flies. Although they look similar to house flies, tachinid flies are very important enemies of cutworms, armyworms, tent caterpillars, cabbage loopers, gypsy moths, sawflies, Japanese beetles, squash bugs, and sowbugs. Grow pollen and nectar plants to attract them.

Dragonflies

Dragonfly - There are more than 80 species of dragonflies. They can be identified by their long narrow body, their large compound eyes and the four transparent wings. There is variation in color. Sizes range from one to two inches. The larvae are found in water. They eat mosquitoes, aphids and other pest bugs. Dragonflies have decreased considerably in abundance as the wetland areas where they live have dramatically decreased. Want dragonflies? Don’t fill in that marshy area. Better yet, enlarge it, or dig your own pond.

Honeybees

Honeybees – Honeybees are important pollinators of many plants. Adults measure 2/3 inch long and are fuzzy, with gold-and-black striped bodies and transparent wings. Honey bees can often be identified by the balls of yellow pollen they carry on the backs of their legs. Grow flowering plants. Encourage wild honey bees. Because the spread of mites has seriously reduced honey bee populations, the wild honey bees that are left are even more important. Fun fact Pollinators are estimated to be worth $8 billion to our economy! Many other insects are pollinators as well.

These good guys will help your garden stay healthy – but there is also a good number of bad guys that can do a lot of damage! For the Top 10 Bad Insects for Your Garden, check out:

http://www.mama-knows.com/gardening-tips/top-10-bad-insects-for-your-garden.html

Hope you enjoyed reading this information and that it will help your gardening efforts! Your comments and suggestion will as always be very much appreciated