This morning I sent Malcolm Campbell an email about that gorgeous little creature on Maggie's jumper. Already he has replied and here is the information he sent me.
It's Order Hemiptera, in the Pentatomidae family of shield bugs. It is a very rich group in Australia with literally thousands of species. Many live under Eucalyptus bark and predate on Gum leaves or Pittosporum leaves leaving tell tale white spots on the upper leaf surface, where they have fed. If you roll any of them over you will notice a long beak underneath and they use this to suck sap from your garden plants and from bushland plants. Sorry I cannot be more specific than that. This particular shield bug is not a commercial pest, but more likely a native of the bush.
Cheers, Malcolm Campbell http://www.greenfingers.com.au/
Cheers, Malcolm Campbell http://www.greenfingers.com.au/
Malcolm answers gardening questions on a local radio program and has the most amazing depth and breadth of knowledge about everything from gum trees to apple trees and shield bugs to spider mites. The history of the use of some herb in India to the soil requirements for a certain plant in a certain suburb of Adelaide - Malcolm has a grip on it all and is so nice as well!
Thanks Malcolm!
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3 comments:
Excellent Kate, that makes sense as we have added natives into our garden and of course we have the huge flowering gum, I shall check out the natives and see if I can find some more. Well done and thank you Malcolm, we always enjoy what you have to say through the media.
It's such a colorful critter.
Kate maybe you could change the name of this post to Garden Bug gets a name!
Wow, what a beautiful, interesting bug!
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