Tag: green lacewing life cycle

Bug of the Week: Green Lacewing Life Cycle

Today’s find is the egg of a green lacewing.

lacewing-egg-croppedLacewing eggs are pretty easy to identify because they are on the end of a hair-like stalk.

A few months ago I found a good example of a lacewing cocoon. Time to make an green lacewing life cycle infographic!

lacewing-life-cycleInfographicGreen lacewings are considered to be beneficial insects because the larvae are predators of scales, whiteflies, aphids, small caterpillars and other potentially pesty insects.

The pupa stage forms within a cocoon that is usually hidden on a branch or twig. The lacewing cocoon may be mistaken for a spider egg case because the silk resembles spider web.

The adults are light green with delicate wings and golden eyes. If disturbed from a leaf they will fly during the day, but are more active at night. The females generally lay their eggs at night.

We’ll probably be seeing more and more of these as our weather warms and the wildflowers start to bloom. Just a few more weeks.

Bug of the Week: Lacewing Revisited

When we looked for insects today, we found some insect eggs on our lemon leaves. What are they?

Lacewing Life Cycle

Can you see the egg? It is the white oval on the hair-like stalk.

lacewing egg

The insect that laid this egg was featured as “Bug of the Week” early on. It is the beautiful green lacewing adult.

green lacewing
The egg has actually hatched, because it is white and the end is open. The lacewing larva that crawled out probably looks something like this on I found on June 18.
green lacewing larva

When the larva has finished development, it spins a cocoon around itself, forming what looks almost like a spider egg case. In fact, I’m sure a lot of green lacewings are destroyed each year due to mistaken identity.

My son and I found this lacewing cocoon underneath a bird’s nest that fell out of a tree last week.

green lacewing pupa

The green lacewing is a beautiful, beneficial insect that goes through a lot of changes during its life cycle.

For more information for kids, try:

Nature Close-Up – Ant Lions and Lacewings  by Elaine Pascoe


Disclosures: The book was from our local library. Also, I am an affiliate for Amazon. If you click through the linked titles or ads and make a purchase, I will receive a small commission at no extra charge to you. Proceeds will be used to maintain this self-hosted blog.