"Sacha" wrote in message
...
On 2/6/04 11:58, in article ,
"Jane
Ransom" wrote:

In article , Jeff
writes
Hi.

What insects will eat greenfly (without then becoming pests
themselves)?
I know about ladybirds, but are there any others?

Hover flies.
A hover fly can lay several hundreds of eggs on a plant and each
larvae
will eat up to 400 greenfly during its life time.

I think that wasps also eat greenfly but am not 100% sure.

Some urglers recommend (swear that the problem disappears)
dotting
those bird peanut feeders round the garden. The theory is that a
bird
will have a coupe of caterpillars for starters, a few peanuts and
then a
few dozen green/black/white fly for pudding!!

It works for us, I must say. We have feeders in the garden and
several in
the greenhouses and both are alive with birds. We have wrens,
blackbirds,
blue tits, chaffinches and sparrows nesting in the greenhouses and
all those
plus thrushes in the garden. They feed on the peanuts in winter and
adults
will take them now, too but we often see them with their beaks
stuffed with
'wrigglers' to take to their babies.

Do you still have the blue tits now that they are needed to cope with
the insect pests?
Mine have gone to their summer quarters.

Franz