Newly Hatched Hemipterans: Stink Bugs? or other?

bugman

February 24th, 2008 at 1:00 am

Categories

True Bugs

tiny red bugs on avocado seed……
hello!
the past few days i’ve been trying to figure out what kind of bugs these are! they are very small (about 1.5mm) with a bulbous, shiny red body, 6 legs, black head and antennas. i found them on my front porch on my avocado seed that was sitting in a glass of water in the sun. at first i thought they were baby ladybugs so i moved the seed out of the water and onto a plant so they wouldn’t drown, but later found that baby ladybugs have the black spots just like adults…..so what are these?!!? i know they are not mites, which is the only "small red bug" i can find on the internet. i live in austin, tx and (if this even matters) the weather has been 65-75 degrees in february. after two days of searching all the resources i could find online i’ve decided to take a shot at writing! they seem so simple, yet i can’t for the life of me figure them out! i’ve attached a few pictures i took this morning…. thank you in advance,
cat presley

Hi Cat,
We can accurately give you a general identification, but we are bound and determined to be more specific. These are newly hatched Hemipterans, True Bugs. We thought they looked like Stink Bugs, but finding them on an avocado pit is puzzling unless the female stink bug just laid her eggs on its surface not considering it as a food source. We did find a very similar image on BugGuide, also from Texas, that is just identified as a nymphal Hemipteran herd, but it is suspected that they are Stink Bugs, family Pentatomidae. BugGuide had another image from Virginia posted with the following comment by Eric Eaton: “They often stay together to re-inforce their warning colors of red and black. After the next molt they will disperse a bit.” Another similar image on BugGuide from California is just listed as True Bugs as is one from Alabama. Another virtually identical image on BugGuide is listed as a not yet identified stink bug nymph.