Minute pirate bug for onion thrips
Minute pirate bugs are among the natural enemies of onion thrips named by UC IPM and UMass, and in laboratory tests O. insidiosus ate more onion thrips than western flower thrips (Summerfield 2024), though the same authors note that greenhouse programmes built for western flower thrips have not controlled onion thrips well in Ontario. We found no published field releases against onion thrips. Outdoors, the practical step is to avoid pyrethroids, which kill pirate bugs, and to keep flowering borders beside the crop.
Before you order
Released into flowering crops against thrips. It is one of the few predators that takes adult thrips, and it lives on pollen when prey is scarce. It is also a common wild predator outdoors. How it works, how to tell it has established and the supplier list are on the full Orius insidiosus profile.
How many do I need?
Area and infestation level in; quantity, cost and a weekly schedule out. Open the calculator →
Other controls for onion thrips
- Amblyseius cucumerisPredatory mite · 10–50 per plant weekly (UC IPM) or 50–100 /m² (Koppert), under glass; both are general thrips rates