Cabbage aphid
The cabbage aphid is a tiny grey-green bug covered in a powdery wax that makes it look bluish white. It lives in big crowds on cabbage, broccoli and their relatives. It only eats plants from the cabbage family and ignores everything else.
How fast is it?
Fun facts
It is like a walking mustard bomb. When an enemy bites it, chemicals inside mix and make a sharp mustard oil.
It gets part of its mustard weapon from the cabbage plants it eats.
Even if thousands live on broccoli right next to strawberries, they never touch the strawberries.
Ladybirds, hoverfly larvae and lacewing larvae help gardeners by eating cabbage aphids.
Most asked questions about Cabbage aphid
?What do cabbage aphids eat?
They suck the sap of cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower and other plants in the cabbage family.
?Are cabbage aphids harmful?
Not to people, but they can damage cabbage and broccoli in the garden.
?What eats cabbage aphids?
Ladybirds, hoverfly larvae, lacewing larvae and tiny wasps.
For bug experts
- Scientific name
- Brevicoryne brassicae
- Group
- True bugs and cicadas
- Family
- Aphididae
- Classification
- Insecta > Hemiptera > Aphididae
- Lives on
- Europe, Asia, North America, Australia and Oceania
- Also known as
- Cabbage aphis
Where the facts come from
- Brevicoryne brassicae (Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0): what it looks like, where it lives, what it eats, sizes and fun facts, retold in simple words.
- Picture by Rasbak. CC BY-SA 3.0, Wikimedia Commons. The round sticker of this bug is cut from the same picture.
If we got something wrong, sorry, we are bug fans, not a science journal. Tell us at [email protected] and we will fix it.
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