hendi_alex wrote:It is pretty hard to tell the difference between an assassin bug and the many similar species that suck plant juices. The assassin bug is a predator and will only be present in numbers that their prey can support. These beneficials are the best of friends in your garden.
The assassin bug has a hooked proboscis with a claw like tip. Many of the plant juice suckers look very similar but their proboscis is is more strawlike and missing the hooked beak on the very tip.
Assassin bug photo taken last year. Note the proboscis.
Assassin bug during two favorite activities: sex and a good meal.
Note the thinner, less lethal proboscis on this juice sucking species. Has a very similar body structure to passion bug, but is a vegetarian that gives a fit on squash and tomato plants.
Here is a mimic to one of our most common assassin bugs, that was in photo #1. Notice the similar coloration, but also notice the thinner proboscis that is adapted for sucking plant juices.
You almost never see passion bugs in more than the one's or two's and in a very wide scattering in the yard or garden. Juice sucking bugs of similar species or family however will be found in large numbers as they linger on and around their host plants of choice.
Note: A common name for the assassin bug is the passion bug. That is because they have a habit of biting a human on the lip while the person is asleep. Little vampires I think! One got in our house and bit our youngest daughter on the lip when she was very young.
