Shoutout to the ladybug larva I nearly killed last week

I was picking off aphids from my romaine and saw this weird spiky thing that looked like a tiny alligator. Almost flicked it off before I googled it on my phone. Turns out it was a ladybug larva and it can eat like 50 aphids a day. I found that stat on a university extension page, not some random blog. Now I check every leaf twice before I pull anything. My balcony tomatoes have been clean for 5 days straight. Anyone else finding bugs they thought were pests but were actually helpers? How do you tell the good ones from the bad?

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kim.nancy20d ago

Ladybug larvae are the ones that look like tiny dragons, and lacewing larvae are the weird ones with the pinchers that look like they mean business. The trick is to stop and watch for a minute before you squish anything with more than 6 legs. If it's moving fast and hunting, it's probably a predator. If it's just sitting there munching on a leaf, that's your pest. I keep a screenshot of the common garden helpers on my phone so I can check before I get trigger happy.