By Emma Rooksby, coordinator of Growing Illawarra Natives

Social media is lighting up in 2025 with images of all kinds of insect: native bees, bugs, beetles, flies, wasps and many more. Invertebrate biodiversity really seems to be having a moment. I normally use this column to write about plants, but am switching things up a bit this week to cover some of these critters that interact with Illawarra's local native plants, namely stink bugs! (And I promise, there's a direct link with the article about Swamp Hibiscus I posted last week.)

Pretty well everyone who has a citrus tree in a pot or in the garden is familiar with the Bronze Orange Bug (Musgraveia sulciventris). This sap-sucking bug is native to coastal eastern Australia, where it has evolved with native citrus species such as the Finger Lime (Citrus australasica). It is generally reviled for its ability to damage native and exotic citrus plants, plus its habit of spraying out a foul-smelling liquid when threatened, and the internet is overflowing with strategies for killing it. Here's an awesome image of a Bronze Orange Bug from MrsKirk72 via Pixabay. 

But! We have other local bugs that aren't such a pest, and that are sometimes confused with the Bronze Orange Bug. The Growing Illawarra Natives discussion group recently had such an incident when a concerned resident shared images of an Illawarra Flame Tree (Brachychiton acerifolius) with a number of orange bugs visible on its ripening seed pods. 

Tectocorisdiophthalmus

But back to the Bronze Orange Bugs to finish!

This species is followed by Climate Watch, an initiative by the EarthWatch Institute, the University of Melbourne and the Australian Bureau of Meteorology to understand how changes in temperature and rainfall affect seasonal behaviour of plants and animals. Its presence is tracked here.