Bronze Orange Bugs

I am generally pro-life in the garden. But there are some things that serve no good purpose (at least as far as I can see!). One of those is bronze orange bugs a.k.a. citrus bugs a.k.a stink bugs (Musgraveia sulciventris). These guys can flourish as the weather warms up. They are native to Australia, and historically have fed off our native finger limes, sucking the sap out of new shoots and fruit. Unfortunately, they don’t discriminate between citrus species and if you leave them be you’ll have lemons and limes and oranges full of dead brown patches in no time.

Bronze orange bug eggs are little pale green spheres, 2-3mm in diameter, laid in clusters on the underside of leaves. They hatch into lime green ‘instars’ (i.e. baby bugs) that are hard to see as they blend well with the foliage. It takes several moults but they eventually change from green through bright orange and a pale yellow before they reach their final stage of mean, brown stink bug.

My main gripe is they don’t really have any predators! Assassin bugs and some other stink bugs will have a go, but they won’t do much for big infestations, so there’s no “waiting for the good guys to come”.

Sprays like pyrethrum can work - they’re better on the younger bugs and you need to target them directly. The older the bugs get, the tougher their shell is. Pyrethrum is also broad spectrum, and will kill all the good things too. My defence of choice is a cheap vacuum cleaner, which can be broad spectrum or targeted, depending on how good your aim is. It also has the following benefits: a) your neighbours think you’re bonkers, so might leave you alone and b) the bugs don’t move fast so it’s easy. Just make sure it’s not your everyday vacuum because it will stink! (Also watch out for the caustic juice they squirt. But get a long enough vacuum tube and you’re good to go).