Humans are finally getting some help ridding the area of spotted lanternflies.
Certain animals are beginning to eat them.
“These are all sort of general things that feed on lots of different insects in the environment,” said Amy Korman, an educator with the Penn State Extension School.
The Praying Mantis, some spiders and bats are just some of the animals beginning to consume the pest.
She says the bad news is, it won't be enough to squash the problem.
“The chances of actually having one predator or a group of predators being able to manage a population just by themselves is pretty remote,” added Korman.
But she says other solutions are in the works, like potentially introducing a parasite or building more effective traps.
The parasitoid is a parasite that kills its host. It’s being studied to see if those will be of value to use sometime in the future to control the lanternfly population.
Another study recently claimed that the lanternfly may not be as harmful to some plants and trees are previously thought.
But, Korman says while the tree may not die, the bugs are still not good for them.
She says the lanternfly is “sort of sucking the lifeblood out of the tree” and that puts stress on the tree. That can lead to other problems.
Andy Amrhein of Evey True Value in Bethel Park has a product called BactroBUG that kills them instantly.
Bonide Eight insect spray also kills them after a few minutes.