Grumbleeze

Ladybugs!

...a boon to the garden, they eat microscopic bugs that can destroy a whole garden if you let them! Many people do not like to use insecticides on their garden plants... especially the edible ones... so what's a poor gardener to do? Well, some ecologically correct gardening experts came up with the idea of selling ladybugs to the home gardener to fix the microscopic bug problem... you know, to eat aphids and things like that. Don't know why and don't know exactly when, but at some point they decided to import that Asian ladybug.

Now... at the onset of winter, many of us are invaded by the Asian ladybug! I've been sweeping and vacuuming up ladybugs for at least four weeks now! When will it stop? Who knows? All i know is i'm getting awfully darned tired of covering everything i cook or bake... even while i'm cooking it..... to avoid a ladybug from landing in the soup!

Did you know the dandelion was originally brought over to the U.S. by immigrants who enjoyed gathering and cooking the fresh dandelion greens in the springtime? ...and who hasn't heard of, if not tasted, dandelion wine? The zebra mussels invading our beautiful Great Lakes came to the U.S. in bilges and on the bottoms of ships... they now threaten water inlets etc. all over the place..... even in inland lakes where they arrive by way of small boats that the little mollusks attached themselves to! Then there's Eurasian milfoil... an import people liked to see in their aquariums... now choking the life from many of our small lakes! Have you ever seen Purple Loosestrife? It's making swampland out of many a pretty freshwater lake... it's so invasive.

Why do these imported organisms become so invasive? Why are they not a problem in their country of origin? .....because we did not import their natural enemies along with importing them! They are allowed to grow and multiply unimpeded by nature!

When will scientists learn that some things are better left alone... that some 'fixes' only create new problems?