They just about destroyed one of our Leyland Cypresses last year: Thyridopteryx ephemeraeformis, Evergreen Bagworms. They devour the needles of the tree, using some of them to camouflage their cocoon and the rest for nourishment. The females — who have no wings, legs, or eyes — remain in their bags their entire lives, and as they never lay their eggs, the new larva emerge from the mother’s carcass.

It’s a lovely little insect, in other words, one that we all love and long for. We just happen to have more than our share of them, and since no neighbors appreciate the sheer destructive capability of such a pet, we simply have to pick them off, one by one, and euthanize them.

It’s really an itch-inducing process that I don’t enjoy, but occasionally it yields a nice surprise or two.

What’s ironic is that we have at least three bird nests in those three, neighboring trees, and one would assume that having birds around would reduce the population of something like caterpillar larvae. Apparently, the camouflage is quite effective.

However, we have yet another tool at our disposal. We are breaking all conventions of warfare and going biological: Bacillus thuringiensis.