Tricrania stansburyi
Pest description A cleptoparasitic beetle (10 to 12 mm) with black and red wing coloring and whose larvae steal food provisions from the host. Adult female beetles deposit eggs on flowers, which emerge as larvae (triungulins) that attach to a foraging female blue orchard bee's (BOB) leg hairs. The bee then transports the beetle larva to the nest, introducing it to a pollen-provisioned BOB brood cell. After the adult BOB seals the brood cell containing a triungulin, the beetle larva kills the deposited BOB egg and consumes the pollen provisions. Only one beetle occupies and develops in one bee cell.
Management Infested cells within paper straw can be identified and removed.