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Asked by:
Sarah Hogarth
Posted at:
January 26, 2025
I work at a retail greenhouse in London, Ontario. We keep about an acre and a half of greenhouse operational year-round. A couple of months ago, we introduced about 600 mealybug destroyer insects to help control our severe mealybug and aphid problem (at a cost of somewhere around $500 - 600). The MB destroyer population is starting to establish itself, and they are reproducing and multiplying well; however, given the severity of our pest problem, I understand that it will take several more months before we really see the mealybug and aphid populations being brought under control. Unfortunately, the greenhouse manager is not as patient as I am, and despite my attempts to persuade him otherwise, plans to douse the whole greenhouse with Cygon while we're closed over the holidays.Mealybug destroyers are a type of ladybug and I think the adults would survive just fine in a fridge, provided they are kept moist and if some sugar water is added to the packing medium they are kept in. I am not at all sure that the larvae would survive, but it would not hurt to try.
My question is this: if I were to gather up as many of the MB destroyer adults and larvae as I can find over the next day or two, could they be stored in some way for a couple of weeks to be reintroduced into the greenhouse later? Could I keep them in paper bags with rafia/irish moss in a cooler? What are the minimum temperatures that they'd withstand? Would the residual effects of the Cygon wind up killing them in the end anyway?