Our ladybugs

We bought a bag of ladybugs Wednesday of last week because we have a few azalea bushes just covered in aphids and white flies. Brandon could not believe you could buy ladybugs. He was so excited he insisted on holding the bag during the ride home. We released them that same night, and they were doing a great job of cleaning the bushes. That is until a bird came and picked them off one by one. I didn't think that small bird could make such a big dent in their numbers, because later than evening I could only find about 5. We bought some more to try our luck just one more time. This time Dylan held the bag during the ride home. We released them last night. They are still sticking around, but some have very different reasons than others. We have placed our bugs into two different categories:

Worker bugs
(click to enlarge)

The Reproducers

I'm having to keep Owen from swatting at the bushes with his toys. He's fascinated by their movement and just hits the bushes to see what would happen. This morning he saw Brandon picking up the bugs, so of course he had to do that too...only problem is he didn't know how. So I find Owen pinching and squishing the bugs in a effort to pick them up and put them on his arm. It was quite a challenge to put the bugs on him, because once they were on, he still wanted to pick them up. We eventually had to come inside for a break from the bugs. When we came back out, Owen was much more relaxed about the bugs. Thank goodness!

The ladybug that lived...