A lot of assassins are lurking in the outdoors now, including in your yard. I’m talking, though, about insects — particularly a class of insects known as assassin bugs.
Assassin bugs in general get their name because they lie low among flowers and other plants to ambush and eat other insects. For that reason, the bugs are good to have around because they prey on a variety of plant-damaging pests such as aphids, caterpillars, Japanese beetles and others. Unfortunately, however, they’re not choosy and also will attack beneficial insects such as ladybugs and honeybees.
In Georgia, the largest and most common assassin bug species is a scary-looking creature known as the wheel bug (Arilus cristatus), which is found throughout the state.
More than an inch long, an adult wheel bug is gray-colored and has long legs and antennae, a stout beak and large eyes on a slim head. Its name comes from a semicircular crest on its thorax that resembles a cogwheel — the only insect species in the United States with such a crest.
Such a large, bizarre creature surely would seem a monster to other insects.
Death from a wheel bug indeed may be gruesome — as I saw firsthand the other day while admiring a patch of black-eyed Susans and other wildflowers in a DeKalb County meadow. Bees, butterflies and other pollinators sipped nectar from the blooms.
Then I saw a wheel bug: With its forelegs, it was holding a small, still-flapping butterfly known as a fiery skipper. I knew what would come next: With its sharp beak, the wheel bug would inject lethal enzymes into the hapless butterfly to quickly kill it and liquefy its tissues. Then, using its beak like a soda straw, the wheel bug would suck up the butterfly’s gooey remains.
But as I watched, the wheel bug with its meal slipped out of sight among the blooms. I refrained from searching for it because if one touches a wheel bug, it may inflict a painful bite — more painful than a bee sting and one that takes longer to heal.
IN THE SKY: From David Dundee, Tellus Science Museum astronomer: The moon will be first quarter on Monday. Mercury is very low in the east just before sunrise. Venus is high in the west just after sunset. Mars is in the southwest at dark. Jupiter rises out of the east a few hours before dawn; Saturn rises out of the east a few hours after midnight.
Charles Seabrook can be reached at charles.seabrook@yahoo.com.
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