The 10 Most Beneficial Insects for your Garden

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green lacewings

You must have seen many different varieties of insects in your garden. Before you reach out for the insecticide, you must know that some insects can be actually beneficial for your garden and may prove its allies. These beneficial insects eat pests which can lead to deteoration of your garden and its plants and thus they keep check on the garden insect population. The following are the 10 most beneficial garden insects:

Green Lacewings

green lacewingsThese insects feed on pollen, nectar and honeydew. They hunt for their prey using their curved mandibles to attack their prey. These prove to be voracious predators and must not be killed.

Lady Beetles

Another insect which might be helpful for your garden is lady beetles. These eat a number of other insects like mealy bugs, scale insects, mites and even thrips and thus protect your garden from getting attacked by those insects which are not good for it.

Assassin Bugsassassin bugs

Another variety of beneficial insects for your garden are assassin bugs. They too attack their victims with ferocity and can prove rather useful for the garden.

Praying Mantids

These insects can handle even the largest of pests in the garden and sometimes even eat their siblings if they get too hungry.

Minute Pirate Bugs

minute pirate bugsAnother useful insect for your garden is the minute pirate bug. This insect may be tiny but it kills off many insects which are not that good for your garden. Their usual victims are mites, thrips and aphids.

Ground Beetles

The larvae of these beetles may feed on slugs, cutworms and many other pests. They even hunt caterpillars and are rather necessary for your garden. So the next time you see them don’t go for the kill.

Syrphid Flies

These eat away most of the aphids in your garden and are thus beneficial for it. The adult syrphid flies also tend to pollinate the flowers which are an added advantage of having them.

Predatory Stink Bugs

These can help keep the pest population in check and also feed on caterpillars and grubs. These must be left alone as they smell bad when disturbed.

Big Eyed Bugs

These garden insects are beneficial for your garden as they feed on mites, insect eggs and aphids with equal ferocity.

Damsel Bugs

damsel bugsThey use their legs to grab their prey which can include thrips, caterpillars, aphids and a lot of other soft bodied insects.