Doing some pruning in the garden and noticed a mistletoe in flower in amongst its host acacia and then noticed the caterpillars feeding on the mistletoe. The question should I kill the caterpillars or maybe the mistletoe? What is the result of my decision? If I kill the mistletoe the caterpillars will lose a food source; If I kill the caterpillars will the mistletoe eventually kill the acacia? I will leave leave the caterpillars as I know they will soon turn into beautiful butterflies and will continue to keep the mistletoe under control in our backyard.
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| Dendrophthoe vitellina |
I will remove the mistletoe after flowering and the caterpillars are gone, as I want to keep the acacia and we have lots more mistletoe on much larger trees that can resist the mistletoe attack.
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| Delias nigrina larvae |
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| Common Jezabel Delias nigrina |
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