30 Days. 30 Bugs. Teaching kids all the YIKES about the Aphid…
During June, I will be offering some pretty interesting bugs to you and your kids… bugs that will excite and entertain kids while teaching them. Each and every little word or fun piece of information is a building block to love of learning and literacy.
Come along for the YIKES! It’s gonna be a buggah!
APHID – There is one theory that the Aphid got its name from the Greek word meaning unsparing… in reference to its monstrous rate of reproduction and/or its appetite for monstrous destruction. In short, the Aphid multiplies a lot, eats a lot and is a super-pest, especially to fruits and vegetables.
The Aphid is sometimes called Plant-Lice, which is not a compliment at all. The Aphid is a family of tiny sucking insects that form huge colonies along the stems or on the undersides of leaves, especially on new growth. The Aphid sucks such large quantities of sap from plant growth that the plant may appear injured or even dead.
A dead giveaway that an Aphid colony has attacked a plant and sucked its nutrients is the sticky sap the Aphids excrete and leave behind. This sap is called honeydew (a nice name for poop).
One major Aphid problem is that the honeydew attracts ants, oh my! The hungry, visiting ants both devour the honeydew and protect the Aphids. Nice teamwork. Back in 1859, Charles Darwin even observed, “An ant began to play with its antennae, on the abdomen first of one aphis and then of another.” With friends like these, who need enemies?
(One more thing about the honeydew is that mold that looks like black dust often grows on it, turning plants a grayish-black color. Not so nice.)
Many Aphids are green, which makes finding these sneaky little pests very difficult. But some species are red, yellow, blue, black, white and even pink. The Aphid looks kind of creepy, too. It is soft-bodied, pear-shaped and caudal-tailed, with long antennae swept along the sides of its body.
The Aphid has some natural enemies, including ladybugs, crab spiders and some wasps. But the easiest and safest way to get rid of these nasty little buggers is a strong stream of water from your outdoor hose. This hose method may have to be repeated many times, though, and here’s why…
A single female can produce billions of descendants from spring to the end of summer. Yikes!
So, kids, here’s the Aphid, with lots to talk about and lots to investigate. And if you want to become an Aphid expert, you’ll be called an Aphidologist! YIKES!
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Join me here each day in June for 30 days. 30 Bugs. – a little fun, a little learning and a lotta YIKES!
