What birds and insects eat Colorado beetles

With appearing every warm period of the year Colorado Beetle Fighting people are more than a dozen years using various methods and poison. For all this time, the pest has been so able to adapt to many toxic chemicalsthat fighting him very often comes to a standstill. An alternative method of protecting potato plantations is to attract insect natural enemies to the planted areas. About who eats the Colorado potato beetle, and will be discussed in this article.

What bird eats the Colorado potato beetle

In large numbers, the natural enemies of the Colorado potato beetle are on homeland pesttherefore, neither in South nor in Central America are representatives of this species a danger to the crop. The desire to adapt predatory insects, such as the picromrus bug, and podizus in the open spaces of our country, did not yield the expected results. In this connection, many farmers began to attract poultry to this process. As a result, pheasants and turkeys coped perfectly with the task. It turned out that in addition to the guinea fowl eating the Colorado beetles, gray partridges also love to eat them.

Colorado potato beetles

The guinea fowl proved to be an effective fighter of the parasite and pecked not only adults, but also insects in the larval stage. We were happy to destroy the birds and the egg pests of the bright protective color. Moreover, to search for leaf beetles, they did not rake the soil with their paws, eating the larvae and adults directly from the tops, without harming the greenery.

On a note!

But it should be borne in mind that both turkeys and guinea fowls have the ability to fly, in connection with which, wing wings are usually cut for birds for this purpose.

No less effective, was walking on the backyard and pheasants. Besides Colorado potato beetle the birds exterminated bear larvae and other garden pests. However, these beetle enemies in Russia do not always tolerate our cold winters. In our country, cuckoos and grouse, starlings and crows feed on the Colorado potato beetle. Such little birds as sparrows do no worse. Although in some sources such information is not true. This fact is explained by the fact that very often birds take larvae for berries.

Some farmers have learned to teach even eating domestic hens to feed on insects by mixing bird food with pest larvae. After some time the young bird began to perceive the insect as food and in appearance and taste. And to get rid of pests, it was enough to release chickens between potato beds.

About Insect Fighters

Colorado potato beetle fighters

In addition to birds, insects can get rid of the potato pest. Colorado beetles feed on ladybugs, gold-eyed, syrphid, or as hoverwomen.

Ladybugs act as a destroyer of larvae and egg clutches of leaf beetles.Golden-eyed and hoverflies are also not able to affect adults due to their small size. But, despite this, they can significantly reduce the number of harmful insects during the formation of larvae.

However, it should be understood that it will not be possible to completely get rid of the Colorado potato beetles by attracting birds and insects to potato fields, but it is quite possible to control their numbers within reasonable limits. You should also take into account the fact that “chemical artillery” is not used to fight the enemy, which is also an important advantage of this method of combat. And besides, natural enemies cope with the pest much faster than doing it manually.