Dragonfli Ladybird Larvae - Live Ladybird Larvae for the Natural Control of Aphids & Greenfly (100)

I bought a pack in March or so and released immediately. I was a little worried about the temperature as the spring turned out to be wet and cold. However, my batch seemed to thrive and this year I've had hardly any issues with aphids where last year there was a really bad infestation, not helped by the fact that I had stopped using chemical controls. I did get ladybird larvae mid summer last year and they sorted the problem out eventually so this year I got there as early as possible and it worked in my garden. Weirdly, I still see lots of larvae but hardly any adult ladybirds so

Arrived very prompty and seemed to have roughly the correct number and they all seemed to be still alive. The larvae are so small that it is impossible to separate them from the shredded paper they are crawling through in their box but I simply applied five equal piles of the paper to five potted lupins which were each completely infested with greenfly sucking the life out of the plants and so numerous each stem was covered in them. When I dropped each pile of paper and larvae down into the centre of the stems that was the very last I ever saw of them. Despite there being food beyond their wildest imaginations available for them I never spotted a single one of them out of the 100 I applied to the plants. I gave them a couple of weeks and the infestation kept getting worse until the plants started wilting with the life being sucked from them by thousands of greenfly. Not a single larvae was ever spotted feeding on this banquet of aphids. I eventually went to the supermarket and bought spray and the greenfly were all dead within hours. I tried to go down the natural route with these larvae but they were useless and I ended up using the pesticides I had hoped to avoid. However, it was too late by now with two of the plants dead. My advice - avoid these larvae as they were less than useless. If it gets to the stage that you have a greenfly infestation then there is only one solution - to quickly apply pesticide.

This comes with zero instructions. Which means you have to do some research. I used chat GPT. Which gave me great advice, and important information. The larvae activity is quite weather driven. Don't expect much in temps cooler than 15 degrees. It took them a couple weeks to get going. My once incredibly heavily infested cherry tree. Is now black fly free. It was also fun learning about larvae behaviour, and their relationships with ants, and black fly. The kids also found this interesting. I hope that they establish a long term solution that lasts several generations of ladybirds. If you want very quick, but less rewarding, and less sustainable results. Use a hose and your fingers to scrape the aphids off.

UPDATE Although we couldnt see many once we released them most of our black fly has indeed vanished . A few were dead when they arrived. We couldnt find most of them after a day or two and still have quite a few black fly

These are OK, but just about. They are really overpriced, and people should look for other purchase options not on this site. There is no release bag, so you are left having to somehow pour them onto the infested bush. I had found another option just after ordering, so I cancelled the order three hours later. Amazon warned me that cancellation might not be possible, but emailed the supplier anyway. They clearly ignored the email, and dispatched my cancelled order 18 hours after I cancelled it. I kept them as I have regard for the live larvae, but there is better out there. I would not order again.

For those of you with fruit trees you will know the struggle of aphids! These are so great to helping the tree thrive and reducing the damage of aphids. I have bought 2 tears in a town and the ones from last year seem to have stuck around and have a thriving population in the tree! So much so that I have bought lacewings to help them out but the tree has tripled it's fruit production as the aphids are being managed. I highly recommend dragonfli and just know that it isn't a quick fix but so much better for the environment than these pesticides

Arrived after about two weeks they were mostly dead in the box the few that were alive didn't last long once i put them out in my greenhouse.. Waste of money ive ordered bugs online before and they're great this was a real let down.

I had read the instructions online prior to receiving the package so as soon as it arrived I got to work placing these little workers, they don't seem to like the tomato plants for some reason which is a bit frustrating but they were happy to climb into the strawberries, beans, cherry trees and wildflower meadow. After placing a few of them on specific plants with a paintbrush I hung the bag with what I expected to be not many left on the elder bush which is where the garden infestation started, a few aphids dropped off the branch as I hung the bag and it didn't take long for the remaining larvae to come marching up and feast! Fantastic to see them get to work so quickly. Hopefully they will stick around too.