bad bug setting up house

Please help. I'm quite a novice and don't know what this is! It looks like a large green aphid (about the size of a kernel of short grain rice puffed up), it's light green, sits in a ball of spit on the underside of leaves or between the leaf and the stem and is easily squished. I tried to take a picture but my camera won't take something that small. It's a blur. I find the things by looking inside curled up leaves or finding spit balls at the base of the leaf. The bug is all over the garden, but not on all of my plants. I've spent hours squishing them individually because I live on a river and I can't (and won't) use chemicals. It's a salmon spawning river and a nature sanctuary. Can you help me? Thanks in advance. PS This is my first post ever!

I've never seen the actual bugs themselves so I have no idea if they fit your description or not, but spittlebugs make little balls of spit, usually on plant stems, at the base of leaves, etc. If that's what you have, then they don't really damage plants and they'll go away on their own in a few weeks. If you don't like the look of the spit balls, you can hose them off. Only thing is at least around here the spittlebugs have long since come and gone, and I don't think you're in that much colder of a zone so I would expect they'd be gone up there too, so it may be something completely different.

I have them in my garden too, they dont do much damage to the plants but when I do find the balls of foam/froth or spit, I normally remove it by my fingers and crush the little green insect that is hidden inside by it's mum, the froth/foam is also harmless to plants or you, it is just natures way for the mum to hide her baby so the birds dont eat the baby, you can also blast them off the plants with your water hose if unlike me, you dont like to murder things that infest your plants, Good Luck. WeeNel.

Thank you for your response. It would be nice to know what they are by name, and what they grow into, but for now I think I'll continue squishing or hosing down. I just won't spend as much time at it! How nice to get an answer from the UK and from California.
I wish it was as simple to get a handle on my beautiful rambling rose that's covered in aphids, mildew and black spot. It's amazing that it's willing to bloom at all. This is my first year in this location, so I'm discovering a lot of melodrama, excitement and joy. I haven't had a garden for many years, and never one this exciting. I really have no idea what I'm doing.

If they're the same bugs that I have, and I think WeeNel's sound like the same ones, then their name (at least here) is spittlebugs, and they grow up into spittlebugs! I think it might be the young ones that are green and hanging out in the spit, I'm not sure where they go once they're older but I've never seen any plant damage at all from them. Here are some pics from Google http://images.google.com/images?hl=en&q=spittlebug&btnG=Search+Images&gbv=2

That's it! A spittlebug. Third row down second from the left--that's the guy. Thank you so much for your interest. I've definitely learned something new today.

Hi Maggie,
"Spittlebugs, also known as Frog Hoppers, are in the Family Cercopidae. They are related to Aphids and Leaf Hoppers as well as other Hemipterans. The spittle is secreted by the Spittlebug's anus and it serves as a protective environment so the nymph can safely feed on plant sap." - http://www.whatsthatbug.com/aphids_2.html

T;hanks Wayfarers. In view of what you're saying, I think I'll just wash those babies right off of my plants! Or squish, or whatever it takes. So far I find I can garden quite effectively without chemicals of any kind. What a treat.