Go Wildscaping

Last weekend I learned about the North American Wheel Bug (Arilus cristatus).

I discovered one climbing on the cosmos by our mailbox. It’s a big animal by insect standards, and if you’re not familiar with it, you might guess it to be a large, plodding herbivore based on its size and vaguely elephant-like proboscis. It was quite shy of me and kept hiding from my camera, so it seemed harmless enough. It reminded me of Gonzo from the Muppets.

Ecologically speaking, though, the wheel bug is definitely not an elephant.

It’s a tiger.

The North American Wheel Bug belongs to the family Reduviidae. This insect family consists almost entirely of ambush predators, which is why members are more commonly known as assassin bugs. Yikes! If you want to see the wheel bug on the hunt, check out the videos on the wheel bug’s Wikipedia page (maybe not while eating though).

Suddenly my wheel bug is looking less like Gonzo and more like a skeksis. (In case you’re not familiar with The Dark Crystal movie from 1982 or the 2019 prequel series, The Dark Crystal: Age of Resistance, the Skeksis are a terrifying race of six-limbed horror-muppets that rule their world, Thra, with an iron fist. They look like a blend of reptiles, birds, and your worst nightmare. Oh, and they suck the life force out of their “prey,” the Gelfling. The remake has a great voice cast, by the way!)

Anyway, this thing was hunting my bees! My cosmos were swarming with bees that day, and I’m sure the wheel bug was very annoyed with me repeatedly interrupting its dinner.

Of course I love my hardworking, fuzzy bees, and I had no desire to watch one have its life force sucked out of it, skeksis-style. Yet I will say this for the wheel bug. It indicates we have a lot of prey in our yard for it to eat.

For the bug-squeamish, here’s why that’s a good thing. Remember that only a tiny fraction of insect species antagonize humans. Apex predator insects are very rarely one of them, and they often eat whatever bugs you. (Ahem. Sorry, couldn’t help myself.)

Other insects that occupy the apex predator niche include praying mantises, robber flies, and dragon flies. (I’ve seen multiple of these types of insects in our yard over the summer, so I don’t think this was a one-off.) I should qualify their apex predator status somewhat, as some of these species will eat each other, and I suspect other animals would happily chow down on even top-predator insects if given the chance. Nonetheless, these insects are an important part of the food chain by keeping prey species in check. In fact, the North American Wheel Bug eats a lot of pest species like Japanese beetles and cabbage worms.

So… even if you happen to find apex predator insects more terrifying than intriguing, resist your dark impulse to kill. (We’re not the Skeksis, after all!) These insects have a job to do by making your garden a more stable and pest-free place!

And if you’re fan of bugs the way I am, get excited when you see an apex predator in your yard! It means you’re on the right track in building a more diverse and resilient landscape!