UPDATE: Why you should not attack a boxelder bug if you are a green anole

Janet Creamer (you should read her blog; it's great) did a bit of sleuthing into Boxelder Bugs - my recent post on this insect RIGHT HERE - and came up with the following:

I was curious about what made them taste bad, too, since they eat stuff in the maple family. Not sure how it is made, but basically they squirt out a foul smelling substance made mainly from 84% beta-pinene (think pine-sol) and 15% limonene (think lemon juice). I guess if I was sprayed in the face with pine-sol and lemon juice, I would decide to eat something else, too. The abstract is below:

Monoterpene hydrocarbons may serve as antipredation defensive compounds in Boisea trivittata, the boxelder bug.
Palazzo MC, Setzer WN.

Department of Chemistry, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, Alabama 35899, USA.

Abstract
Boxelder bugs, Boisea trivittata, are deterred from predation by green anoles (Anolis carolinensis). Hydrodistillation and GC-MS analysis reveals B. trivittata to contain the volatile monoterpene hydrocarbons beta-pinene (83.9%), limonene (14.7%), myrcene (0.8%), and (E)-beta-ocimene (0.6%). The presence of these antifeedant volatile chemicals may serve to provide some protection of boxelder bugs from predation.

So there you go. My advice to any Green Anoles who may read this blog and are thinking of confronting a Boxelder Bug? Unless you want to get blasted in the face with pine-sol strongly laced with tart lemon juice, don't do it!

Boxelder Bug

The Boxelder Bug, Boisea trivittata, a rather good-looking bug if I do say so myself. I found myself along the municipal pier at Huron, Ohio, the other day and ran into a boatload of the little critters.

I will wager that I was one of few people there that day who appreciated the beauty of these neat little bugs with their nifty orange and black pattern and beady blood-red eyes. This type of bold advertisement color patterning is known as (word of the day) APOSEMATIC. Aposematism is all about predator deterrence - warning off the bad guys with a caution sign before they attempt to eat you. Many animals employ bright colors to let the world know of their dangers: poison dart frogs, coral snakes, insects that eat toxic plants such as milkweeds, etc.

I'm not sure what nasty juices create toxicity in Boxelder Bugs, but apparently they are foul to eat.

Here is why we saw so many of the bugs along the pier. All of those trees along the left are Box-elder, Acer negundo. It is a type of maple, and Box-elders hold their clusters of brown helicopter-like fruit well into winter, and the tree in the foreground is still loaded with fruit.

Box-elder Bugs tap sap from the trees, and live most of their lives in and around them.

Scanning far down the pier, I saw a small knot of people staring intently at the sunny face of a rock wall, and knew what they must be peering at. Sure enough, they were by turns fascinated and horrified by a massive cluster of Boxelder Bugs that had congregated on the limestone.

This behavior is what gives the bugs a bad name - they gather en masse seeking sheltered hibernation spots as the weather turns cold in late fall. Sometimes, their favored spots are on people's houses and this irks the homeowner.

I guess the average Suzie Homemaker is appalled to step out for the morning newspaper and encounter a scene like this on the faux wood siding. Can't blame 'em, I suppose. If you've had this issue, I have no experience in how to purge wild masses of Box-elder Bugs from one's homestead. But, just go to THE GOOGLE and type in "box-elder bug control" and many of the world's exterminators will gladly dispense advice.

Fortunately, at least for the bugs, this swarm was far from any dwellings and those that saw them rather seemed to enjoy the spectacle.