For other uses of Beneficial see: Beneficial Bank

Beneficial Bank

Beneficial Mutual Bancorp, Inc. operates Beneficial Bank, a full-service bank that provides financial services including personal and business accounts as well as mortgages to the Philadelphia area, including the Delaware Valley and southern New Jersey. The bank has over 60 branches in their...

 and Beneficial weeds.

Beneficial insects (sometimes called beneficial bugs) are any of a number of species of insects that perform valued services like pollination

Pollination

Pollination is the process by which pollen is transferred in plants, thereby enabling fertilisation and sexual reproduction. Pollen grains transport the male gametes to where the female gamete are contained within the carpel; in gymnosperms the pollen is directly applied to the ovule itself...

 and pest

Pest (animal)

A pest is an animal which is detrimental to humans or human concerns. It is a loosely defined term, often overlapping with the related terms vermin, weeds, parasites and pathogens...

 control. The concept of beneficial is subjective and only arises in light of desired outcomes from a human perspective. In farming and agriculture, where the goal is to raise selected crops, insects that hinder the production process are classified as pests, while insects that assist production are considered beneficial. In horticulture and gardening; pest control, habitat integration, and 'natural vitality' aesthetics are the desired outcome with beneficial insects.

Encouraging beneficial insects, by providing suitable living conditions, is a pest control strategy, often used in organic farming

Organic farming

Organic farming is the form of agriculture that relies on techniques such as crop rotation, green manure, compost and biological pest control to maintain soil productivity and control pests on a farm...

, organic gardening or Integrated Pest Management

Integrated Pest Management

Integrated pest management is an ecological approach to agricultural pest control that integrates pesticides/herbicides into a management system incorporating a range of practices for economic control of a pest...

. Companies specializing in biological pest control

BioControl

BioControl is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published by Springer Science+Business Media covering all aspects of basic and applied research in biological control of invertebrate, vertebrate, and weed pests, and plant diseases. The journal was established in 1956 as Entomophaga and published by...

 sell many types of beneficial insects, particularly for use in enclosed areas, like greenhouse

Greenhouse

A greenhouse is a building in which plants are grown. These structures range in size from small sheds to very large buildings...

s.

Types of beneficial insects

Some species of bee

Bee

Bees are flying insects closely related to wasps and ants, and are known for their role in pollination and for producing honey and beeswax. Bees are a monophyletic lineage within the superfamily Apoidea, presently classified by the unranked taxon name Anthophila...

are beneficial as pollinator

Pollinator

A pollinator is the biotic agent that moves pollen from the male anthers of a flower to the female stigma of a flower to accomplish fertilization or syngamy of the female gamete in the ovule of the flower by the male gamete from the pollen grain...

s, although generally only efficient at pollinating plants from the same area of origin, facilitating propagation

Plant propagation

Plant propagation is the process of creating new plants from a variety of sources: seeds, cuttings, bulbs and other plant parts. Plant propagation can also refer to the artificial or natural dispersal of plants.-Sexual propagation :...

 and fruit

Fruit

In broad terms, a fruit is a structure of a plant that contains its seeds.The term has different meanings dependent on context. In non-technical usage, such as food preparation, fruit normally means the fleshy seed-associated structures of certain plants that are sweet and edible in the raw state,...

 production for many plants. Also, some bees are predatory or parasitic, killing pest insects. This group includes not only honeybees, but also many other kinds that are more efficient at pollinating. Bees can be attracted by many companion plants, especially bee balm and pineapple sage for honeybees, or apiaceae

Apiaceae

The Apiaceae , commonly known as carrot or parsley family, is a group of mostly aromatic plants with hollow stems. The family is large, with more than 3,700 species spread across 434 genera, it is the sixteenth largest family of flowering plants...

 like queen anne's lace

Queen Anne's lace

Queen Anne's lace may refer to the following plants:* Ammi majus* Daucus carota* Anthriscus sylvestris...

 and parsley

Parsley

Parsley is a species of Petroselinum in the family Apiaceae, native to the central Mediterranean region , naturalized elsewhere in Europe, and widely cultivated as an herb, a spice and a vegetable.- Description :Garden parsley is a bright green hairless biennial herbaceous plant in temperate...

, for predatory bees.

Ladybugs are generally thought of as beneficial because they eat large quantities of aphid

Aphid

Aphids, also known as plant lice and in Britain and the Commonwealth as greenflies, blackflies or whiteflies, are small sap sucking insects, and members of the superfamily Aphidoidea. Aphids are among the most destructive insect pests on cultivated plants in temperate regions...

s, mite

Mite

Mites, along with ticks, are small arthropods belonging to the subclass Acari and the class Arachnida. The scientific discipline devoted to the study of ticks and mites is called acarology.-Diversity and systematics:...

s and other arthropods that feed on various plants.

Other insects commonly identified as beneficial include:

• Minute pirate bug
• Big eyed-bug
  Geocoris
  Geocoris is a genus of insects in the family Lygaeidae . Commonly known as the big-eyed bug, Geocoris is a beneficial predator often confused with the true chinch bug, which is a pest.Big-eyed bugs are true bugs in the order Hemiptera...
  
  
• Assassin bug
  Reduviidae
  Reduviidae is a large, cosmopolitan family of predatory insects in the suborder Heteroptera...
  
  
• Damsel bug
  Nabidae
  The insect family Nabidae contains the damsel bugs. The terms damsel bug and nabid are synonymous. There are over 400 species. They are soft-bodied, elongate, winged terrestrial predators. Many damsel bugs catch and hold prey with their forelegs, similar to mantids...
  
  
• Mealybug destroyer
• Soldier beetle
  Soldier beetle
  The soldier beetles, Cantharidae, are relatively soft-bodied, straight-sided beetles, related to the Lampyridae or firefly family, but being unable to produce light. They are cosmopolitan in distribution. One common British species is bright red, reminding people of the red coats of soldiers, hence...
  
  
• Green lacewing
  Chrysopidae
  Green lacewings are insects in the large family Chrysopidae of the order Neuroptera. There are about 85 genera and 1,300–2,000 species in this widespread group...
  
  
• Syrphid fly
• Tachinid fly
• Ichneumon wasp
  Ichneumon wasp
  The Ichneumonoidea are insects classified in the hymenopteran suborder Apocrita. The superfamily is made up of the ichneumon wasps and the braconids...
  
  
• Trichogramma wasp
  Trichogramma
  The wasps of genus Trichogramma, commonly known as "stingless wasps", are some of the most widely-studied agents of biological control in the field of entomology. Trichogramma wasps are tiny Hymenopteran insects, measuring 1 millimeter in length or less, that parasitize the eggs of many types of...
  
  

Attractive plants

• Plants in the Apiaceae
  Apiaceae
  The Apiaceae , commonly known as carrot or parsley family, is a group of mostly aromatic plants with hollow stems. The family is large, with more than 3,700 species spread across 434 genera, it is the sixteenth largest family of flowering plants...
  
   and Asteraceae
  Asteraceae
  The Asteraceae or Compositae , is an exceedingly large and widespread family of vascular plants. The group has more than 22,750 currently accepted species, spread across 1620 genera and 12 subfamilies...
  
   families are general valuable companions.

See also

• Companion planting
  Companion planting
  Companion planting is the planting of different crops in proximity , on the theory that they assist each other in nutrient uptake, pest control, pollination, and other factors necessary to increasing crop productivity...
  
  
• International Organization for Biological Control
  International Organization for Biological Control
  The International Organization for Biological and Integrated Control of Noxious Animals and Plants is usually referred to as the International Organization for Biological Control or IOBC...
  
  
• List of companion plants -- a common companion plant's function is the attraction of beneficial insects.
• List of beneficial weeds
• Organic gardening
• Sustainable gardening
  Sustainable gardening
  Sustainable gardening comprises a disparate group of horticultural interests that share, to a greater or lesser extent, the aims and objectives associated with the international post-1980s sustainable development and sustainability programs...
  
  
• Wildlife garden
• Satoyama
  Satoyama
  is a Japanese term applied to the border zone or area between mountain foothills and arable flat land. Literally, sato means arable and livable land or home land, and yama means mountain...
  
  

External links

• Association of Natural Biocontrol Producers- trade association of the biological control industry
• Beneficial Insects for Hydroponics