Hibiscus: Small Weavel bugs inside Hibiscus seeds?????, 1 by Gitagal

Gitagal wrote:
I have seen this almost every year and I am baffled.
There are these tiny (less than 1/8th ") weavel- like bugs that eat the insides out of each seed and leave a hole--sort of like a bead. They are hard-bodied, like a beetle would be and black in color. Not easy to squish one.

I do not know WHEN they set up housekeeping inside the seeds, but they are not apparent when I remove the seed heads and take out the seeds and put them on a plate to dry. They show up later after I have put all the seeds in small plastic bags. It seems they can exist just fine without air for a long time.

Tonight, I was going through all my bagged, collected seeds and in several of the bags from my Perennial Hibiscus, many of these bugs were clustered near the "zipper" end. When I shook the bag, you could see many of them crawling all over the seeds. I dumped the whole baggie out on a plastic plate and these weavels were crawling all over. Some of them were actually still crawling out of the holes in the seeds. I squished many of them and then sprayed a houseplant insect killer on the plate and spread it all around. It seemed to kill them. However, now i have wet seeds and have to wait until they dry to re-package them.

As far as I can imagine, I think the seeds with their centers drilled out will never germinate. What do you all think? So, now if someone wants my Hibiscus seeds, i would have to sort the seeds all out using a magnifying glass. NOT an easy job.

Can anyone tell me what these are--how do they get in there--what can I do in the future to prevent them--PLEASE!!!! Does anyone else have this problem?

The Hibiscus I have is a tall, perennial variety that blooms only after 3 years from seed. I have a red one and a whitish pink one. They grow about 5' tall--IF the variety matters.

I tried taking a close-up picture of one of the bugs, but my camera's macro does not work so great. This bug is on the rim of a Styrofoam plate. I hope you can make it out.

Thanks, Gita