Are pill bugs (woodlice) pests or beneficial insects, what do they eat, and are they poisonous?

The scientific name of the pill bug is woodlouse, also known as damp bug, ball bug, ground louse, etc. It is the common name for animals of the genus Porcellio in the family Oniscidae, with more than 150 species worldwide, so are pill bugs pests or beneficial insects? What food do they eat? Are they poisonous?

There are many kinds of pill bugs, and their bodies are mostly long oval, slightly flattened, with adults 9—15mm long, gray on the surface, and glossy. The dorsal-ventral flattening is very pronounced, and they are grayish brown or grayish blue; after being startled they curl up into a ball. They are a herbivorous terrestrial group, with chewing mouthparts, and the front edge of the head and its left and right lateral angles are prominently protruding. They are the only crustaceans fully adapted to living on land, and they are distributed from the seaside all the way up to highlands at about 5000 m above sea level. Pill bugs are one of the groups of crustaceans adapted to terrestrial life, usually living in moist places rich in humus, such as under stones in damp areas, under rotting wood, in tree holes, in moist grass and moss clumps, under water vats in courtyards, under flower pots, and even in damp shady places indoors.

Are pill bugs pests or beneficial insects? Are they poisonous?

For agriculture, pill bugs are pests. In fields they mainly damage melon seedlings and the young shoots and tender roots of cruciferous vegetables, as well as berries such as strawberries, and they like to eat the leaves of rapeseed, mustard, bok choy, tomato, cucumber, pumpkin, bottle gourd, soybean, cowpea, amaranth, water spinach, lettuce and edible fungi, etc. They mostly live in dark, damp corners, especially preferring to shelter under rotten wood, fallen leaves and stones, and they sometimes also appear in houses and courtyards. Pill bugs do no direct harm to people; on the contrary, some people raise them for medicinal use or experiments.

How should pill bugs be controlled properly?

1. Agricultural control: control irrigation, reduce field humidity, and lessen their damage; after harvest, clean the garden promptly and deep-plow the soil to reduce the source of the insects.

2. Trapping control: when overwintering adults and larvae of pill bugs begin to become active, set up piles of dead leaves and weeds in the evening to lure and gather them, then kill them early in the morning.

3. Applying poisoned soil: mix 2.3% deltamethrin or 20% fenvalerate with soil and spread it on the ground, using 50-100 grams of pesticide per mu mixed with 10-20 kilograms of soil.

4. Ground spraying: spray with 80% dichlorvos emulsifiable concentrate, 0.45% malathion emulsifiable concentrate at 1000 times dilution, or 2.5% deltamethrin emulsifiable concentrate or 20% fenvalerate liquid at 3000 times dilution.

In fact, besides being an agricultural pest, the pill bug also has value as a traditional Chinese medicine

In traditional Chinese medicine, the pill bug has medicinal value. As a medicinal material, the pill bug comes from the dried whole body of the common pill bug, an animal of the family Armadillidiidae, or the pill bug, an animal of the family Oniscidae, mainly produced in Jiangsu. Domestic literature research has found that the extract effects of the two are basically the same, so it is feasible to use them interchangeably without distinction in clinical practice.

According to the "Compendium of Materia Medica", the pill bug is sour in nature and cool, and has the effects of relieving asthma, promoting diuresis, detoxifying, relieving pain, and calming. For external use it has a blistering effect, and can be used to treat asthma, difficult urination, blood strangury, amenorrhea, infantile convulsions with clenched mouth, sores and swelling, and chronic malaria with chills and fever, etc. In addition, the farming of pill bugs can be applied to livestock and poultry feed.