This week, when I was out in the vineyard tying up the vines so Cliff could mow, I began to see “oodles” of these little critters.
These are Lady Bug Larva, or “alligators” as we affectionately call them. Little workhorses in a Regenerative environment where we don’t spray toxic pesticides.
There were “tons” of adults also, the lady bugs!
They have a voracious appetite for soft body insects and they were
Feasting in the vineyard. This is the time of the year that the Phylloxera insect make their way from the ground up to the leaves on the French/American Hybrids to make a house in the leaves where they live. It doesn’t hurt the leaf, just looks ugly.
It has been nearly 4 years since we have sprayed any toxic material to control them. This year the lady bugs are feasting indeed.
The first time we saw these ladybug larvae was back in California when we were growing strawberries. Cliff and I were so busy that when we saw the “alligators”, we were heartbroken thinking that we had failed the first year we tried to grow them. But, we were so busy with two young children and farming Organically that we didn’t have time to do anything about them… When the manager of the Coop that we were shipping our produce with came to the farm and saw them, he laughed and told us they were good guy bugs! What a relief!
April 29, 1988 Manteca News
Here’s an article from the past, showing our strawberries, our workers and our children helping!
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