Ride 'em, Cowboy!

Lady beetles, aka ladybugs, eat lots of aphids. Did we say lots of aphids? Lots of aphids.  They have no portion control. 

If you watch closely, you'll see them gobble aphids like theater-goers devour buttered popcorn. Ladybugs eat so many aphids you wonder if they'll ever be able to lift off the plant.

Last Saturday we observed the usual: a ladybug chomping down aphids. But wait! What was that riding on her back? Coud it be? Was it?

It was. An aphid was riding the ladybug like a cowboy on a bucking rodeo bull. Didn't the aphid know that one little slip, and no more happy trails?

"Well," one wag said, "that's the safest place for an aphid--on the back of a ladybug."


By Kathy Keatley Garvey
Author - Communications specialist

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