• Assassin bugs

    Beneficial

    The head is narrow and elongate with the portion behind the eyes neck-like. Sometimes a sculptured crest may be found on the pronotum. The front legs are specialized for hunting.

  • Bees and bumble bees

    Beneficial

    Principal species are honey bees and bumble bees. Bumble bees have a robust black body covered with hair of variable colors (yellow, orange, black, and white). Honey bees are more delicate; they are golden brown with yellow rings on the abdomen, and have a hairy body.

  • Black hunter

    Beneficial

    The adult is a slender, sharply pointed, blue-black insect with silvery wings, which are held over the abdomen.

  • Braconid and chalcid parasitic wasps

    Beneficial

    Brown or black, these wasp species are small and difficult to differentiate from one another, except that chalcids have greatly enlarged hind femora (third leg segment). They have two pairs of membranous wings, segmented antennae, and a very distinct head, thorax and abdomen.

  • Braconids

    Beneficial

    Braconids are small black, orange or yellow wasps that prey on larvae of grape berry moth and other insects. Adults are less than 10 mm long, and many species are found in vineyards and surrounding woods.

  • Damsel bugs

    Beneficial

    Damsel bugs have long bodies that narrow slightly toward the head. They have stout beaks and large front legs for grasping prey.

  • Gall midges

    Beneficial

    The adult resembles a small mosquito.

  • Glassy-winged mirid bug

    Beneficial

    The adult is similar to the tarnished plant bug (Lygus lineolaris), but with a more elongated head and has translucent wings crossed with two black lines at an angle; also, without the cream-colored scutellum.

  • Green lacewing

    Beneficial

    Green lace-wing adults (10 to 12 mm) have net-veined wings and gold-colored eyes. They feed on nectar, pollen and aphid honeydew. Some lacewing species are brown and smaller. Lacewing larvae are alligator-shaped with long, piercing mandibles. They are active predators of soft-bodied insects. Brown lacewing adults are reddish brown. They have large, membranous, brown wings and long antennae with a long, thin body. They are smaller than the green lacewing. The brown lacewing lays several hundred oval eggs per female on the undersides of leaves; the eggs are not on stalks like green lacewing eggs. The larvae appear similar to green lacewing larvae. They are gray to brown and alligator-like. They have large, sickle-shaped mandibles.

  • Hover flies

    Beneficial

    The adult is a fly that mimics the coloration of wasps; it often hovers during flight. It is found among aphid colonies, often co-existing with other predators such as the gall midge.

  • Ichneumonid parasitic wasps

    Beneficial

    They have a slender body; very distinct head, thorax and abdomen; two pairs of membranous wings and long, segmented antennae. The female’s needle-like ovipositor (at the tip of the abdomen) is as long as or longer than its body.

  • Ichneumonids

    Beneficial

    Ichneumonids are small black, orange or yellow wasps that prey on larvae of grape berry moth and other insects. Adults are less than 10 mm long, and many species are found in vineyards and surrounding woods.

  • Lacewings

    Beneficial

    The adult is green (Chrysopidae), or light brown (Hemerobiidae) with large translucent membranous wings that are held roof-like over the body. Brown lacewings are typically half the size of green lacewings.

  • Lady beetles

    Beneficial

    Adults are oval and convex in shape, often brightly colored (e.g., orange-red or yellow) and usually with black spots or marks on their wing covers, sometimes with a checkerboard appearance.

  • Minute pirate bug

    Beneficial

    Adults are very similar in size to the mullein plant bug (Campylomma varbasci), but their head is narrower and their wings are colored contrasting white and black.

  • Mullein plant bug

    Beneficial

    Adult is grayish green with black spots on the legs. The nymph resembles an apple aphid or a white apple leafhopper and is solitary, very mobile and lacks cornicles.

  • Multicolored Asian lady beetle

    Beneficial, Insect

    The multicolored Asian ladybeetle, an introduced species, feeds on pests during summer. They may be many colors with several or no spots and can be distinguished from other ladybugs by the black M or W (depending on the viewing direction) between the head and abdomen (see photo).

  • Parasitic wasps

    Beneficial

    Most parasitic wasps are tiny, and they often develop inside their hosts, so detecting them can be difficult. Some recognizable signs of parasitism include unusual host (pest) behavior, host body darkening, and the presence of emergence holes or cocoons on the pest.

  • Phytoseiid mites

    Beneficial

    A dark mark in the form of an "H" sometimes appears within their body. This mark is red when they feed on European red mites and yellow when they feed on twospotted spider mites. They move very rapidly on the leaves.

  • Predatory mites

    Beneficial

    Predatory mites can be distinguished from pest mites by observing their movement. When disturbed, predators generally move more quickly than pest mites. A ratio of one predator to 10 pest mites is often sufficient for effective biological control.

  • Red velvet mites

    Beneficial

    Balaustium is a large, bright red mite with a tick-like shape and a dense velvet-like covering of dorsal setae.

  • Shield bugs

    Beneficial

    Many shield bugs, pentatomids, are predatory and can attack beetles and caterpillars.

  • Spider mite destroyer

    Beneficial

    Adults are oval, convex, uniformly shiny black, and covered with sparse, fine yellowish to white.

  • Spiders

    Beneficial

    live in the grape canopy and eat small insects.

  • Spiders: Foliage Hunters

    Beneficial

    The body of a spider is divided into two regions, the cephalothorax and abdomen. The cephalothorax bears the eyes (various numbers and arrangements), mouthparts, pedipalps and legs (four pairs), and the unsegmented abdomen bears the genital structures, spiracles, anus and spinnerets (silk-spinning structures).

  • Spiders: Foliage web-builders

    Beneficial

    The body of a spider is divided into two regions, the cephalothorax and abdomen. The cephalothorax bears the eyes (various numbers and arrangements), mouthparts, pedipalps and legs (four pairs), and the unsegmented abdomen bears the genital structures, spiracles, anus and spinnerets (silk-spinning structures).

  • Stigmaeid/"Yellow" mites

    Beneficial, Insect

    Agistemus fleschneri is the principal species found in QC and northern ON orchards, while Zetzellia mali predominates in the US, southern ON and the maritime provinces.

  • Stink bugs

    Beneficial

    The adult has an oval shield-shaped body, grayish or brownish in color; a spur is present on each side of its thorax. Eggs, grouped in masses of 20 to 30, are in the shape of small barrels. They are gray, cream or gold-colored, decorated by a ring of small hairs.

  • Syrphid fly

    Beneficial

    Syrphid fly adults resemble bees but have only one pair of wings and much shorter antennae. They can be seen hovering in the air near plants. Their larvae are predators. Syrphid fly larvae are usually light green, legless maggots, rounded at the rear and tapering to a point at the head. When the maggot is crawling, the head moves from side to side.

  • Tachinid flies

    Beneficial

    The adults are similar to a housefly but are covered with stiff hairs. The larvae have the appearance of small maggots and feed inside caterpillars and other hosts.

  • Tachinid fly

    Beneficial

    Tachinid fly adults are hairy and bristly. Their larvae feed on the larvae of some pests.

  • Trichogramma wasps

    Beneficial

    Trichogramma wasps are egg parasites of many insects, including grape berry moth and leafrollers. Parasitized eggs are dark black rather than the yellow-cream of healthy eggs.