Red and Black bug
March 7, 2010
I am doing these bugs as an experiment and I am having difficulty identifying them. They are being raised in a petri dish and eat water and sunflower seeds.
Cassalyn Sands
North Carolina
Hi Cassalyn,
You didn’t really indicate the nature of your experiment, and if sunflower seeds are a necessary component. This is an immature Large Milkweed Bug, Oncopeltus fasciatus, and milkweed, not sunflower, is its food of choice. According to BugGuide: They eat the “Seeds of milkweed plants.“