Ok, I remebered hairy, and bigger, but, but that is a plastic spoon next to it, so it is at least 1.5" long.

Black soldier fly?

Black Soldier Fly

Could be. I would be ok with that, but none of the pics show the orange middle that my bug has. I didn't realize black soldier flies were that big. My bug was fixated on the straw bales I have tomatoes planted in. Not really interesred in the plants. Was it laying eggs? I have found several garter snakes in that straw. I think they came with the straw. I am trying to be tolerant, because they eat slugs, but ewww. Some days I am really girlie.

I have so much of the old fence line riddled with black soldier fly larvae. I scoop up that soil to inoculate. Some raise BSF larvae instead of worms. The larvae are voracious eaters and just the right size to bust up the soil.

I don't think BSF eat anything, but lay eggs.

I don't have these but I have these huge black beetles. I hate them they look like Jurassic park runaways. Kill every one I see, yuk!!!!!j

That's a Mydas Fly! I was out in the garden last summer and one flew in close and landed. It sounded like a small helicopter. It was huuuge. They aren't terribly common in the united states.

I believe you are correct, Slowlytyped. I couldn't find much on them, other than the larva eat grubs in the soil and the adults are probably short lived. Still, they are classed as beneficial, so I am happy.

Amy, For what it is worth, I have observed the huge insect population on our land for a very long time, and I bet 90% of the damage I see is done by only about 3-5% of the insect types. Most insects are far more beneficial than damaging. Even the ones that do damage rarely do enough damage to upset me. Of course, in that group of damaging insects that do upset me, I lump together all the ones that do severe damage: cutworms, fruitworms, grasshoppers, squash bugs, stink bugs, squash vine borers, corn earworms and Eurpoean corn borers. Oh, and leaf-footed bugs. Even though I am never happy to see some other pests like spider mites or blister beetles, most years they do not do enough damage to kill the plants.

Stockergal, Most of the black beetles I see here are ground beetles that are beneficial insects. About the only beetles that bother my plants enough that I consider them a problem are the blister beetles. I try to ignore blister beetles because they eat grasshopper eggs, but occasionally their population level gets so high that you cannot ignore them. We rarely if ever have a single Japanese beetle here, and the June bugs that actually appear as early as April munch on ornamentals more so than edible plants, so I just try to ignore them since the ornamentals bounce back pretty quickly once the June bugs are gone. We have tons of beetles, including some gorgeous emerald green ones, and I don't mind them at all. They help our gardens more than they hurt them.

Dawn

This guy is still in the same area and landed on my watering wand yesterday. I don't know what his attraction is, but he certainly isn't shy of humans. Maybe there is more than one, because I swear yesterday's fly was bigger than the pic. Maybe they're mating.