Earwigs

[freakypalmguy]

Hi all,

I just noticed that down in the crown of one of my palms was a bunch of earwigs, are they harmful to palms? Are they munching on it or just nesting. The palm is about a 5 gal size, 18" tall, strap leafed, and appears very healthy.

Thank you,

Matt

[MattyB]

Matt, I have millions, no make that billions, of these guys around my place. They love dry mulch. They do like to nest in the crowns of certain palms but don't seem to cause any damage. I periodically spray out the crown with a jet of water just to wash out the gunk but they're harmless. I get them all over inside my house too. They cannot be stopped. I've been meaning to take a short video of what happens when I turn over a large rock. The ground moves with thousands of them all scattering for shelter. It's pretty impressive.

[Corrosion]

Well but dont let them get to your ears actually it´s just a myth and besides nasty look they are harmless indeed. I have them here too even inside during summer

[MattyB]

I told Paul to put his ear to the ground so he could hear them talking. Now that's the only thing that's in his head.....thousands of earwigs....and soup. I just tell it like it is.

[Perito]

They caused spear pull in my little Bismarckia a couple years ago. It survived, but I still don't like the little !@?*!!!'s. Perry

[tjwalters]

Earwigs can be VERY destructive. I would try to get rid of them. I've heard that they will hide in short sections of garden hose laid around the garden in the evening, which can then be emptied into a bucket of soapy water in the morning. Repeat as necessary. I've not tried it, so can't vouch for its effectiveness.

[MattyB]

I've also heard that you can lay some corrugated cardboard around and they'll hide inside there, then you can just throw it away. But this won't work for Matt's place in Temecula, only in a small garden.

[osideterry]

I had one crawl in my ear and wrap itself around my cerebral cortex. Ricardo Montalban was able to control me like a puppet. I was able to overcome the creature's mind control and serves as Enterprise tactical officer in the climactic battle against Khan.

Sorry no photos.

[tjwalters]

I had one crawl in my ear and wrap itself around my cerebral cortex. Ricardo Montalban was able to control me like a puppet. I was able to overcome the creature's mind control and serves as Enterprise tactical officer in the climactic battle against Khan.

Sorry no photos.

I remember once watching an old horror movie (black & white?) where the doctor was finally able to extract the offending earwig from the ear of a woman who was being driven crazy. The bad news: it was a female, and had laid eggs! - at which point the movie ended. Don't know if there was a sequel.

(Of course, earwigs do not infest people's ears.)

[osideterry]

Confession time. It was an earworm known as a Ceti Eel. Not an earwig. Earwigs don't crawl into ears.

[gavilan1]

I had one crawl in my ear and wrap itself around my cerebral cortex. Ricardo Montalban was able to control me like a puppet. I was able to overcome the creature's mind control and serves as Enterprise tactical officer in the climactic battle against Khan.

Sorry no photos.

I haven't had a good belly laugh from anything that I've read here in a long time. This one did it. I was so not expecting what you wrote... Thanks!

[nachocarl]

They make good food for carnivorous plants!

[nachocarl]

and

[nachocarl]

mmmm!

[_Keith]

I have them everywhere as well. I think in every single potted plant I have is a few taking up housekeeping. I have tried to stay mostly organic here, and seeing no evident damage I have tolerated them.

But I confess to not liking them.

[freakypalmguy]

Hilarious. Like Doug said, I didn't expect these responses either

Thank you all for the advice, I went ahead and blasted them out with water.

Matt

[MattyB]

You're not really detering them with the water, they'll come right back in a matter of minutes. But it does wash out the earwig poo and dirt....poodirt.

Terry, I was belly laughing too. Especially when you said, "sorry no photos".

[www.dadluvsu.com]

I tame and ride them...

[osideterry]

Classic photo William!

[freakypalmguy]

You're not really detering them with the water, they'll come right back in a matter of minutes. But it does wash out the earwig poo and dirt....poodirt.

Terry, I was belly laughing too. Especially when you said, "sorry no photos".

I went out and sprayed with some bug killa. Thanks dude.

[freakypalmguy]

Classic photo William!

Excellent

[DoomsDave]

Great pics and dialogue!

Hmm. I've not found that they harm palms at all. I think they like dicots much better.

CLICK HERE FOR EARWIG ARTICLE

Earwigs is the common name given to the insect order Dermaptera characterized by membranous wings folded underneath short leathery forewings (hence the literal name of the order—"skin wings"). The abdomen extends well beyond the wings, and frequently, though not always, ends in a pair of forceps-like structures termed cerci. The order is relatively small among Insecta, with about 1,800 recorded species in 10 families. Earwigs are, however, quite common globally. There is no evidence that they transmit disease or otherwise harm humans or other animals, despite their nickname pincher bug.

CLICK ON LINK FOR MORE

[iwan]

I planted a 15g Jubaea last year. During the winter it started declining to the point where this spring, just the last couple spears had stalled and were browning. I marked them a month ago and they have hardly moved, but are now starting to open as our daily temps are in the 80's. Yesterday I checked the growth marks and tried to see if the spear would pull. Several earwigs came out of the growth point. Not sure it the earwigs are/were the cause of the decline, or just taking advantage of the situation.

Like others, we have these everywhere, but I have never seen them in a palm, only under pots and piles of mulch.

[John Case]

Are you speaking about the Vincent Price classic 'The Tingler"?

The basic premise was that when people get scared, a tingle wnet up the spine and when they screamed, the tingle went away. He scared a mute woman who could not scream, operating on her spine and removed the 'Tingler' which looked like and overgrown earwig. Of course it escaped and proceeded to wreak havoc amont the populus. My memory of this movie is when the Tingler was tracked into a movie theater and Price ran in and shouted "The Tingler is loose, everybody scream!" which of course disabled the Tingler temporarily.

A SciFi classic!

I had one crawl in my ear and wrap itself around my cerebral cortex. Ricardo Montalban was able to control me like a puppet. I was able to overcome the creature's mind control and serves as Enterprise tactical officer in the climactic battle against Khan.

Sorry no photos.

I remember once watching an old horror movie (black & white?) where the doctor was finally able to extract the offending earwig from the ear of a woman who was being driven crazy. The bad news: it was a female, and had laid eggs! - at which point the movie ended. Don't know if there was a sequel.

(Of course, earwigs do not infest people's ears.)

[tank]

Seem to only go after compromised palms.

Wrath of Ricardo

Probably the second movie I saw in the theater. The bug sequence left me terrified to this day.

Wrath of Khan is my favorite of the bunch, although I haven't seen the new one.

[tjwalters]

Seem to only go after compromised palms.

Wrath of Ricardo

Probably the second movie I saw in the theater. The bug sequence left me terrified to this day.

Wrath of Khan is my favorite of the bunch, although I haven't seen the new one.

Actually, I may have been thinking of this old Night Gallery episode.

[Scott]

Tales of the crypt had an episode where a man hired someone to put one in his wifes ear while she slept to get rid of her..... But since it was dark... they got the wrong one and put it in his..... Oh well!

[Mark Heath]

I tame and ride them...

William,

What a great photo!! How friggin long have you been waiting to post that one????? That was Fantastic!!

Terry,

Thank you for the laugh!! I watch Star Trek as well and had a great chuckle w/ that one!!

[mushrooms]

Yeah yeah...old thread. But I wanted to tell you guys a good way of trapping them I found out about online. Used cooking oil in a can.

I placed one out about a week ago next to some potted plants. And notice it knocked over the next day, I guess the cats may have did that looking for something tasty. Anyways I prop it back up and there's only like a film of oil left. Checked the can today and found about 2 dozen of them in there. So I learned it doesn't have to be a lot of oil. Just enough to keep them from crawling out. If you put enough cans out there you can control them. They only reproduce once a year around late winter here.

Earwigs, I guess, are picky eaters and do not just eat anything. Once they find something they like, it can drive you crazy. I have noticed they love eating young banana leaves (and they love nesting in banana plants too. Among other things, they eat the new growth on Citrus hystrix, catnip, and several types of vegetable seedlings. Thankfully they don't eat palms at least not any of the types I have.

[AggiePalms]

But seriously, all laughing aside, I really did have an earwig crawl in my ear while sleeping. It was really unpleasant having it bang around on my eardrum as it tried to crawl further down my ear canal. I had to get to the doctor that morning as soon as they opened, and they crushed and removed the nasty beast. Even to this day, I don't want them around my garden, gives me the tingly-willey-crawlies.

But no, I've never seen any damage to palms; just sometimes filling the void spaces between roots of potted plants.

[nomolos]

How do these get in the garden, do they blow off on windy days? I don't see how these could hurt plants

[www.dadluvsu.com]

LOLZ!

[BS Man about Palms]

nice...

[ZPalms]

I didn't wanna start a new thread but I've noticed earwigs are living under my mulch around my sabal palmetto, I just want to be sure that they aren't gonna cause any damage?

[Silas_Sancona]

1 hour ago, ZPalms said:

I didn't wanna start a new thread but I've noticed earwigs are living under my mulch around my sabal palmetto, I just want to be sure that they aren't gonna cause any damage?

Some homework, about Earwigs:

https://blog.nature.org/science/2020/07/13/weird-and-unbelievable-facts-about-earwigs/

https://owlcation.com/stem/Earwigs-Facts-Myths-and-Natural-Pest-Control

[ZPalms]

6 minutes ago, Silas_Sancona said:

Some homework, about Earwigs:

https://blog.nature.org/science/2020/07/13/weird-and-unbelievable-facts-about-earwigs/

https://owlcation.com/stem/Earwigs-Facts-Myths-and-Natural-Pest-Control

So they are just hiding or taking refugee in my mulch? so they won't cause any harm to my sabal? I saw that they can eat live plant material but then theirs other benefits but I just don't know

[Silas_Sancona]

6 minutes ago, ZPalms said:

So they are just hiding or taking refugee in my mulch? so they won't cause any harm to my sabal? I saw that they can eat live plant material but then theirs other benefits but I just don't know

Mulch is a nice, mild and moist environment ..perfect hiding spot for them, and most other ground dwelling insects.. As long as there is plenty of other things to snack on, they're generally less likely to go after plants.. mainly young and tender plant parts..  European Earwigs may attack plants more often than native sp. though. Really like soft stuff like over ripe fruit, seedlings like beans over tougher plant material. Though they may sample that sort of stuff.. 

As the last article mentions, you can set out traps to keep numbers in check ..if you see any problems.

[ZPalms]

2 minutes ago, Silas_Sancona said:

Mulch is a nice, mild and moist environment ..perfect hiding spot for them, and most other ground dwelling insects.. As long as there is plenty of other things to snack on, they're generally less likely to go after plants.. mainly young and tender plant parts..  European Earwigs may attack plants more often than native sp. though. Really like soft stuff like over ripe fruit, seedlings like beans over tougher plant material. Though they may sample that sort of stuff.. 

As the last article mentions, you can set out traps to keep numbers in check ..if you see any problems.

My yard naturally has tons of them but I think they may have enough stuff to keep them occupied as I live near a swamp and theirs tons of springtails ect, as far as I can tell the sabal doesn't look bothered or touched so their must be enough bugs under the mulch for them to eat, Thanks!

[Silas_Sancona]

13 minutes ago, ZPalms said:

My yard naturally has tons of them but I think they may have enough stuff to keep them occupied as I live near a swamp and theirs tons of springtails ect, as far as I can tell the sabal doesn't look bothered or touched so their must be enough bugs under the mulch for them to eat, Thanks!

Yep, as long as they're fat and happy, they generally aren't much trouble. Don't think they've bothered anything i have here.. Birds love them.

[njpalmguy]

On 4/20/2009 at 12:10 PM, freakypalmguy said:

Hi all,

 

I just noticed that down in the crown of one of my palms was a bunch of earwigs, are they harmful to palms? Are they munching on it or just nesting. The palm is about a 5 gal size, 18" tall, strap leafed, and appears very healthy.

 

Thank you,

 

Matt

 

http://www.paranormalknowledge.com/articles/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/earwigs.jpg

saw one on my patio while practicing basketball on a 60 degree day in December 2021, pretty sure I smashed it LOL