A possible new species of debris-carrying green lacewing larva

A customer, who lives in the Gold Springs subdivision in Columbia, brought in a specimen for identification. It turned out to be a debris-carrying green lacewing larva. The debris consisted mostly of dead ants. I found one bark beetle too, along with fibrous, stringy materials.

I sent the images to Dr. Lynn Kimsey of the Bohart Museum at UC Davis, who contacted Dr. Catherine Ann Tauber (aka Kady), an expert at green lacewings. She is probably the top authority on these insects, and wrote “A Systematic Review of the Genus Leucochrysa (Neuroptera: Chrysopidae) in the United States.“

Per request, I sent Kady the sample. She replied, saying “it definitely is in the green lacewing genus Leucochrysa (Neuroptera: Chrysopidae). This is a very large, mostly Neotropical genus, with two poorly defined subgenera. A total of only seven Leucochrysa species are reported from the USA. … and, at this point, your larva seems different from those of all of the known species.”

Dr. Tauber thinks it might be related to Leucochrysa nigrilabris, a South American species.

The ants were odorous house ants, with the identity of the ants confirmed by Dr. Philip Ward. 

If you find one of these insects, please save it, alive if you can, and contact us at Foothill-Sierra Pest Control. More specimens are needed. These YouTube videos show similar debris-carrying lacewing larvae, to help you get an idea of what they look like. video1 video2 video3

Here are some images from the web. These insects can use a variety of materials for their camouflage.

Dr. Tauber cleared the specimen of the ants and took photos. A couple are attached, below.

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Update. 17 August 2020. A customer in Groveland, Charlene Chavez, in Pine Mountain Lake, recorded a video of an odd insect. It was crawling on the shower wall. We sent the video to Dr. Tauber, and she confirms it is the unknown debris-carrying lacewing. The customer did not collect, and did not harm, the insect, and let it go on its way. She shared the video with our service technician, Ryles Richards, who recognized it as the species we are looking. Now Charlene is looking for it, again.

Original post: 13 May 2019, Columbia Ca.

Below are images we took of the Columbia specimen. We need more specimens so that Dr. Tauber can raise the larvae to adult to properly identify the species.