Hello out there in the gardening universe. This is Kevin of Epic Gardening and today we're going to talk about the Mexican Bean Beetle, also known in Latin as epilacna varvestis and I actually believe I pronounced that correctly for once in my life

All right today. It looks a lot like a ladybug. It actually looks like a different colored ladybug.

But, whereas the ladybug is a wonderful beneficial insect that I've recommended many times on this podcast.

The Mexican Bean Beetle will prey not on other pests,

but on the plants in your garden.

So let us figure out how do we deal with it.

Well what's funny is that the Mexican bean beetle is actually one of the rare lady beetles

that feeds on plants instead of other pests.

So for that reason it is actually called the Bean Lady Bird and it's not good.

We don't want it in the garden despite its relation to the lady bug.

And so as always with these pest guides we talk about the life cycle because if we can disrupt the life cycle

at any stage we stand a good chance of killing this pest off in the garden.

So in the late spring adult Mexican bean beetles emerge from their dormant overwintering

state then the females will begin to lay their eggs. from their

dormant overwintering state, then the females will begin to lay their eggs.

And what they'll do, like many other pests, is they will lay these eggs in groups of about 50 to 75

on the undersides of leaves.

Then, once these larva hatch they can spread rapidly

through a field they will lay waste to the crops there. This in this larval phase

as with many pests it's the phase when the most damage occurs because they are eating and they are eating and they are eating in order to get through their in-stars and the Mexican bean beetle goes through four of these molting cycles.

Once they do that, once they're done, they will attach themselves to the underside of a leaf

and they will pupate there.

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