aphids on my broccoli!

today i noticed aphids in my garden for the first time, on 3 small broccoli leaves close to a new head that just started growing. the 3 leaves were just COVERED completely and I have never seen aphids in my garden before so it was really strange. I am getting some lady bugs tonight from the nursery. I am actually really excited and almost wanted aphids because I wanted a reason to buy and unleash a whole tub of lady bugs.

I removed the 3 leaves and smashed them to kill all the aphids, I didn't see anymore so I hope the lady bugs have enough to eat! I am just assuming that if I found that many there are probably lots more I don't see?

You can shoot them off w/ a hose instead of pulling off the leaves. I don't think they will come back, at least they don't for me. I used to buy ladybugs, but they always left. Now I see the ladybug larva on some of my plants, I think it is from my neighbor who buys them every year. Better her than me to spend the money.

Good luck.

i don't really want them in the soil, i don't know if the water would kill them or just discourage them. I want the ladybugs in my backyard, I am just worried the dog will eat them! She likes to jump up and catch flies in her mouth, she will chase them for at least 10 minutes before she gives up.

You can spray them with a mixture of Murphy Oil Soap and water. Just put a squirt or 2 (or 3) of soap in a spray bottle, add water till full, put the sprayer on, shake and spray to your heart's content. You'll have to check daily for new critters, but this should help.

PM,
I read that once the aphids hit the dirt, they're fair game for other predators who will eat them up before they have a chance to crawl back up your vegetation. So, not to worry. They won't be on the ground long, anyway!

Lady bugs will only stay as long as they have a food source and will fly away if that occurs. If they linger long enough to lay eggs the hatching larvae are also voracious aphid killers and they cannot fly at that stage. If you have adult lady bugs look for bright yellow egg clusters on leaves and stems. The larvae are black/gray with yellow/orange markings. It is interesting that you say you are going to purchase lady bugs. For some reason they spontaneously appear in my gardens just when I notice aphids. They linger long enough to pretty much eat them all and lay eggs which starts the cycle over again. Usually after the first early aphid problem I do not seem to be plagued by them for the remainder of the season.

i've seen a few ladybugs in my garden before but only one or two, and I had a LOT of aphids all of a sudden! I released them last night, I didn't know they couldn't fly at night, how helpful, this morning lots of them had congregated on the fence posts and the aphids I had looked untouched. hopefully the ladybugs get their berrings and decide to stick around a little longer before flying away.I didn't know i could knock the aphids off the leaves, I will try that tonight. Do you think any oil soap will work cause I have no use for murphys oil soap in my home, no wood furniture. I was planning to buy some peppermint oil castile soap to make a spray to ward off other critters too. do you think that would work?

I have never used Murphy's as an insecticide. I assume it must interfere with the insects ability to breathe. I think that the lady bugs you have released will do the trick. Perhaps if you hand place them on the infected plants they will begin to feed.

i tried to hand place them on the leaf with all the aphids and they just tried to crawl up my arm. they are cute but dumb.

Great thread! I encourage people to learn more about this very old species "Ladybug" New blog on the Hx. of the Ladybug:
http://historyoftheladybug.blogspot.com/

I release ladybugs in the spring and then again in the fall. In the fall, the larvae overwinter in the leaves of one of my flower beds and I have THOUSANDS of baby ladybugs in the spring!

Ladybugs are the best... I found this pic online somewhere of the different stages of ladybugs...

my ladybugs all flew away, i probably didn't have enough for them to eat. I have a teeny garden, hopefully they come visit.

I stopped purchasing ladybugs after the first time (or was it the second time) they just flew away! I rarely see them in my garden, but that's probably because I rarely see aphids.

locakelly - that's a nice group of photos of ladybugs. Their offspring always remind me of alligators for some reason.

I found that photo when I was trying to figure out what these nymphs in my garden were.

Back in the day (not so long ago) I kept finding these scary little orange and black critters in the garden and started killing them... Then I thought maybe I better find out what they are, huh? No more killing baby ladybugs for me!

locakelly - Oh, my goodness! I bet you wanted to say "sorry" ten thousand times over! I saw a bug the other day that I had never seen before - I let it live just in case it was a "good bug" - then I worried that it might be a "bad bug" ready to have baby bad bugs!

Why do we do this to ourselves?!

LOL - I'm really careful with my new bug discoveries now... Especially since I figured you can't judge a book by it's cover so to speak. Those baby ladybugs are scary looking! You'd think they were bad guys!

locakelly - it just occurred to me - I took a photo of it!

Hmmmmmmmm - never seen one of those before... Maybe post it on the Bug ID forum and see if they know. Now I'm curious - lol...

Honeybee,
Would love to know what that is. My daughter and I think it looks like some kind of cockroach. I am sure it isn't, but you never know.

I thought it looked rather like a cricket. Haven't seen another - perhaps it was just passing through.