Getting to Know: Brown Marmorated Stink Bug

By now many of us have seen these pesky little stink bugs coming into our homes in late fall and reappearing throughout the winter. I personally like to watch their antics as they crawl about. However, I'm not too fond of invasive species, so I'm at a crossroads when coming upon a straggler within my home.

Fortunately, these bugs don't bite, they don't ruin the insides of your home or anything like that. They're simply winter visitors that just happen to enjoy being warm in the winter. It's what they do outside that's the problem.

Like many of its relatives, the BMSB feeds on a variety of fruits, vegetables, ornamentals and agri-crops. Examples include peaches, pears, apples, raspberries, grapes, beans, peppers, soybeans, corn, redbud, walnut, maples, catalpas, holly, butterfly bush, honeysuckles and roses, just to name a few.

As you can see from the photograph, they have the common "shield" shape that other stink bugs have. However, you will notice the distinguishing characteristics as circles and marked in red.

Controlling the BMSB inside the home is as simple as finding where they are coming in and sealing the hole. Common points of entry include cracks around window frames and doors, exhaust fans, baseboards or chimneys. They may not be the only things getting in; other arthropods could use these same entrances and you may be losing energy to these holes. 

Stinkbug crawling on my phone charger.

Although you can't tell from this picture I snapped with my phone, the BMSB has white stripes on its legs and antennae, along with an almost checkered pattern along its sides.

Outside it's a bit more complicated. As an invasive pest -- it came to PA around 1996 from China or Japan -- it doesn't have the common predators that other stink bugs do; yet like other stink bugs, they will swarm and infest crops. Chemicals are being developed and introduced as a way to help curb the populations, however, that just sounds horrible to me.

For a more detailed photo, check out Rutgers' BMSB page here.

Emerald Ash Borer General Information

By now we've all heard of the emerald ash borer and know that it's bad. But why? Most of us know that these beautiful but extremely devastating insects kill off ash trees in large numbers.

The EAB came to North America during the 1990s, although a specific year is unknown. In 2002, the Detroit and Windsor areas first began reporting ash trees dying off due to the insect. As of now, the EAB is destroying ash trees in the Great Lakes region of lower Michigan, northern Indiana, Ohio, the Chicago area, Maryland and Pennsylvania. (US Forest Service). Other states, including New York, Missouri, Tennessee, Kentucky, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin,  and Iowa also have either localized or state-quarantined areas of infestation.

Description:

• Metallic green wings, although sometimes seen as metallic reds and purples
• Cylindrical and linear body shape
• Approximately 1/3- to 3/4-inch long
• Top of abdomen metallic purple or red
• Blunt head
• Larvae are transparent white to creamy white and up to 1-inch long

Plants I'm Considering

Well, we all know I've been excited about planting more natives this year. There are so many to choose from, and the best part is they all will lend greatly to a natural look and habitat.

One of my all-time favorite flowers is the black-eyed susan. There's a couple different varieties, but I think the more common ones will be what we choose. I'm also gonna go a bit crazy with monarda (also known as wild bergamot and bee balm). If you've never had the chance to smell bee balm, it is a wonderfully refreshing scent with characteristic, fun-shaped flowers. Purple and yellow coneflowers will look nice; as mentioned before they are also a favorite food source for more than a few species. Beautiful asters will lend to the fall color, and I absolutely love them! I have a feeling asters will make it into my pressed-flower art and resin casting next year.

To round out the look, I'll probably plant some bluestem, little or big, along with a few prairie roses and sedges.

For shrubs, I'm thinking maybe some arrowwood viburnum and maybe ninebark. Dogwoods also are abundant in Indiana and who doesn't love those?

We will be cutting down our silver maple this year; it's seen the best of its life and is slowly dying and becoming a sad eyesore. We're not sure which tree we're going to plant there, although we were going to go with a bald cypress. Not anymore, considering our pact to only go with native plants. It has to be a tall, shade-giving tree. We have a baby thornless honeylocust growing close to it right now, we may just leave it where it is and skip replanting in the place of the old silver maple.

If you live in Indiana, or even the surrounding region, I urge you to check out Indiana Native Plant & Wildflower Society to get an idea of natives to spruce up your garden!

New Studio Space

Even though my store isn't up right now (I gave my ornaments out as Christmas gifts and I haven't made many presses lately), I'm still crafty.

Shaun and I recently switched studios, so his music studio is in the back bedroom and my art studio/spare room/office is in the front bedroom. This room is smaller, but I like the layout. I have everything squared away where I want it -- well, almost everything. I still have to get Shaun's large metal shelf out of here, but we're waiting until he gets the last section of his new floor painted so we can put it in his room.

Shaun built most of my new hutch/workspace design for me, we still have to build the hutch part and get it painted. I can't wait.

For those who don't know, I dabble in a lot of different crafts. Painting, sketching, resin casting, wood crafts and a few other things. I'm going to start working with watercolor pencils for the first time, and I also have my first oils to start working with as well.

From the door

Workspace area (Huge metal shelf on right will be gone - new work table will be there)

An old dresser works as a great storage center! Painting it is the next task!

New shelf Shaun built for me! Everything is right within grasp of the desk!

Gardening for Wildlife (and Key Features for a Wildlife Garden)

This is the year our landscape will come together and become a safe haven for wildlife of all sorts -- not to mention a relaxation haven for my husband and I along with our dogs. Growing up in rural settings, I'm used to coyotes, opossums, raccoons, groundhogs and deer running around the edges of the property. While I'm not happy in the city, I am content with knowing I can still provide a habitat for smaller wild animals, birds and arthropods in my yard.

My lonely birdbath, cottonwood tree and some of our euonymus. This will
look greatly different (hopefully) by the fall of 2012

While my favorite plant is Russian sage, I'm going to stick with the five I have and not buy any more. There are plenty of native species that will complement the feathery-soft silver foliage and lavender-esque flowers.

My plan is to get a couple of low-growing native shrubs for cover. Maybe a few native junipers will do this for me, and a couple of honeysuckle bushes. I have this grand idea that trumpet flowers or native honeysuckle vines would look gorgeous growing up the exterior chimney and one spot on the back of the house. I might just go crazy with some native coneflowers. Coneflowers are excellent food sources and provide a bounty of color.

Getting Ready for My Natives!

In my last post, I talked about how to take care of your garden and plants during the winter. Yes, it's still winter. Actually, if you live in NE Indiana like me, it's just now winter considering it's been so incredibly mild (today it is back to being mild -- 10 a.m., mid-30s and a mix of sun and clouds).

Although I haven't began sketching out our garden and landscaping plans for this coming year, we have talked about what's going in and what we want in our veggie garden.

We decided (o.k., I decided and told Shaun) that this is the year we are starting with all natives. Yes, we have several non-native species in our yard, and even some euonymus. Luckily, we don't have full-size euonymus (burning bush), we have a more compact variety that grow to about 7 feet tall. I'm not sure of the exact cultivar -- they were here when we bought the house. Euonymus is an invasive species, although the smaller varieties may not be as much of a threat as the large, 20-foot-tall-plus regular variety.

While I can buy my natives at the nursery I work at, I can also dig several species up from the woods that line my parents' property. While I know those woods like the back of my hand, I know that there are a lot of plant species I've taken for granted out there and never really paid attention to.

Not a huge fan of may apples, but those grow in insanely large patches in the woods out there. I'm also pretty sure I've seen some Jacob's ladder. This spring and summer, I plan on looking for some natural coral bells, Jacob's ladder, spiderwort, American honeysuckle, wild roses and wild lilies. There are also several native grasses out there, and I love grasses.

I want my yard to be more natural. I get sick of looking at green lawns. It's not natural. The grasses we plant in our lawns are somewhat invasive and are definitely alien. As you've guessed from my blog, I'm also disgusted by the lack of habitat for wildlife and the general consensus that it's okay as long as the people are happy.

When my yard becomes developed with my native plants, I plan on certifying it with the National Wildlife Federation as a wildlife garden. My neighbors might think I'm insane trying to attract wildlife instead of exclude wildlife, but hey, maybe they should follow suit.

My next posts will be about ideas for my landscape, wildlife gardens and other related information!