Susan:

Is your flying Daddy Long Legs a Dragonfly? I don't know if they eat aphids or not but I love that they wreak holy havoc on the mosquito population. We take great pains to get dragonflies outside safely due to their fondness for mosquitoes.

Kate

Here is a link that might be useful: {{gwi:261581}}

Hi Susan,

Really hard to tell without a picture, but taking a guess, i believe you might be referring to the "Giant Cranefly" or one of their many North American species. They are often called Mosquito Hawks here in Canada. However, the adults fly's don't actually feed on anything. Thier sole adult purpose is to mate, lay eggs, drink beer and die. Okay, I may have added to beer part in relation to myself.

It is the larvae that can do some damage, but typically minor, as they feed on roots and crowns of turfgrass, vegetables and small trees.

Here is a link to a picture and brief description. Let me know if this is the insect.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgurl=http://l.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/i/ligans/animals/lg/is0067_1lg.jpg&imgrefurl=http://kids.yahoo.com/animals/insects/3865--Giant%2BCrane%2BFly&h=120&w=180&sz=10&hl=en&start=4&tbnid=kB6FfkqkGyFF5M:&tbnh=67&tbnw=101&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dgiant%2Bcranefly%26gbv%3D2%26hl%3Den

I heard they were Mosquito Hawks when I was in Santa Barbara last weekend.

Cranefly, listed as a bad bug on my chart. A pest of turfgrass...now who cares about lawn, anyway? (just joking)

Here is a link that might be useful: cranefly info

Mosquito hawks would be my guess, too. They always fly in the house and bite me when I rescue them. I've never seen any damage, but who would recognize one in larval state?

Thanks so much, you guys! After reading what you wrote, I did a search, and they're definitely Crane Flies (aka mosquito hawks). I'm really familiar with dragonflies, and these guys are way smaller and more delicate. (And it's interesting that dragonflies are known in some parts as mosquito hawks...I'd never heard them called that here... we just call them dragonflies). The really weird thing is that I'm pretty darned observant about the bugs in my yard, and I don't recall seeing such a huge number of these things at one time as I am now. Must be some weird confluence of conditions. And "oh well" on my theory about them eating my aphids... I guess my squishing and hosing are finally paying off. And I actually saw one ladybug the other day! Anyway, thanks so much to all of you for your help!

Susan

nice dragonfly pic. My favorite insect. When dragons are flying around over the lake you put on a (imitation) dragonfly pupae on the end of your sinking line and fishing is GOOOOD. Plus I just think they are amazing and beautiful too. My daughters are afraid of craneflies when they come in the house.