Green Lacewings

by Morgan Greene

They may not have psychedelic wings or produce golden honey, but green lacewings are just as important to your garden as bees and butterflies. In fact, these little insects start tending to your flowers much sooner than most. While bee grubs are still developing in their hives, lacewing larvae are scarfing down mites, aphids, harmful beetles and other pests, earning them the nickname “aphid lions.”

To ensure their young will have plenty of food, green lacewings lay their eggs in early spring on plants that aphids and other pests are likely to visit. Each individual egg stands upright on the end of a thin stalk. This helps distance the eggs from one another, so that the hungry larvae don’t eat their siblings when they hatch. The female lacewing also lowers the odds of her offspring eating one another by laying the eggs by themselves or in small groups rather than all together.

Lacewing larvae provide invaluable pest control services from spring to fall— a single aphid lion can devour more than 150 pests in a single week! These helpful larvae can be recognized by their forwardfacing pincers and mottled, lip-shaped bodies. Some also carry debris on their backs as protective camouflage, which gives them the appearance of a walking piece of moss or lichen.

After three molts, aphid lions wrap themselves in soft, spherical cocoons and develop into bright green, lacey-winged adults. Even grown up, green lacewings do plenty to earn their keep in the garden: while not as efficient as bees, lacewings are still effective pollinators and sometimes continue to prey on garden pests, not to mention that they give rise to more aphid lions.

Green lacewings are native to the Cape Fear region, and can be commercially purchased to help fight off agricultural pests in gardens and on farmland. Ladybugs are another frequently purchased pest control species, but aphid lions are more effective because they cannot fly away when released. For a more natural approach, planting flowers like goldenrod and yarrow is a great way to attract nectar-feeding adult lacewings to your garden.

So, when you see these spindly green insects flitting about your porchlight, take heart—you’ve got some very special neighbors looking out for your garden this spring.

Morgan Greene is a junior at UNCW majoring in biology with a concentration in freshwater and terrestrial conservation. She enjoys sharing fun facts about insects and other tiny animals on her blog, The ArthroBlogger, found at thearthroblogger.com.