Flower Head Weevil

This evening we chopped some musk thistle and took photos of the Flower Head Weevil which is doing a good job of eating the seeds before they can go to seed. Here you can see the eggs the weevil lays on the bottom side of the thistle head (circled in the photo to the right).

Then we cut it open to show the larvae eating the developing seedheads. Richard doesn’t have many thistle, due in part to the weevils, but mostly due to good pasture management.