Just sharing our experience - we found Green Mama's Saturday, and invested in 2 cartons of ladybugs.
Was it ever hard to get them on the leaves - they were so happy to be out of that container they were crawling madly and didn't care if you were holding a big leaf there for them to get on, they would just rather go up your arm. Meanwhile, 50 others were crawling out of the container. What a trip.
I don't have a lot of optimism about this experiment.
Caroline
Ladybugs
The container I bought one year told me to water the area and plant I was going to release them on and "after dark" open the net pouch and place it at the bottom of the plant. They didn't fly off and most were on the same plant that next morning.
I had a horrible aphid infestation and bought some LBs. I released them at dark after sprinkling the area and they are still there, and LB larva, eating the heck out of the aphids.
The ladybug larvae do a heck of a good job destroying the aphids. The ladybugs themselves can't hold a candle to the babies!! LOL
I was so surprised at how quickly the larva started showing up. Perhaps they were already in the works when I bought the gang of 2000 as I call them.
Plus I found some twice stabbed lady beetles this weekend. New to me.
babsey...if it didn't work, you might try again and release after watering and at night. Just open the end of the bag and sit them down under foliage.
Yes, just as I feared - it was a dismal failure.
I feel bad for the ladybugs, and also for our $20 lost.
We waited till after sunset. Perhaps "night" means pitch black. And we did water, just as the container said.
I have not seen ONE live one, even the next day, and today I found ONE dead one. Only one.
So disappointing.
That would be give you sour grapes on the deal. I expected to see more than I did the following morning but then my yard was quite large. I had the other stages show up later so I know that they did lay eggs. Make sure you look at pics in the files so you don't kill them when they do.