Today, I give you an ecological hero story about a little beetle that gives us biocontrol over a very invasive plant, the Leafy Spurge. When I saw the video reel by @saintpaulnaturalresources about releasing the Leafy Spurge Beetle (Aphthona lacertosa) at Pig’s Eye Regional Park as a biocontrol against invasive Leafy Spurge, I got curious.
I have been on an insect art study indulgence lately. In the wild, the Leafy Spurge Beetle is black and about the size of a flax seed. I took liberties with its color. Perhaps I have gone outside the realm of science and created a whole new species of Aphthona.
Meet the Leafy Spurge Beetle. In nature, he’s black, small as a flax seed. I took liberties with its coloring.
Watercolor, 11 x 14 inches on TwinRocker handmade artisan paper. © 2026 Kristin Maija Peterson.
But how did the Leafy spurge get here in the first place? The first two lines on the Minnesota Department of Agriculture web page on biocontrol and the Leafy Spurge Beetle are these:
“Leafy Spurge made its way into Minnesota in 1890 with a bushel of oats from Russia. By 1992, it was estimated that 800,000 acres were infested with Leafy Spurge in the state, including the Twin Cities area.”
Oats, Empire, and an Accidental Hitchhiker
Oats? From Russia? What was going on in Minnesota in the 1890s?
For that answer, we need to go back to the time of Catherine the Great. During her reign, Russia had invited German-speaking Mennonite farmers to settle in the southern grain belt of the Russian Empire (Ukraine, the Volga region, and Black Sea steppe) in the late 1700s. By settling to farm in these regions, they were promised religious and civil exemptions, including freedom from compulsory enlistment into the military. Heck of a deal if you can get it in Russia.
All good things came to an end, however. In 1871, Russia revoked these exemptions, and that caused tens of thousands of these German farmers to emigrate, heading straight for the Dakotas, Minnesota, and the Canadian prairies. Here they found the climate and soil to be strikingly similar to what they had farmed in Russia. If you are going to farm on another continent, best to bring seeds with you. And so these farmers did. What was tangled in their oat seed stores was — you guessed it — Leafy Spurge seeds.
There was also a formal agricultural exchange happening at the time, too. The USDA’s Plant Introduction office was actively sending seed grain from Russia to the north-central United States. Contamination from weed seed was highly likely given how rudimentary seed-cleaning methods were at the time.
Leafy Spurge Beetle vs Leafy Spurge
Both the Leafy Spurge plant and the Leafy Spurge beetle are native to Europe and Asia, where the beetle controls the onslaught of Leafy Spurge from taking over prairies and farm fields. Because the Leafy Spurge beetle is not native to Minnesota, the MDA spent a lot of time researching the beetle as a biocontrol species. Nobody wants a repeat disaster like the one that happened with rats and mongooses on the Hawaiian islands.
But it’s not the Leafy Spurge beetle itself that controls the Leafy Spurge. Rather, it’s their larvae. The Leafy Spurge beetle is known to bury its eggs at the base of the Leafy Spurge. When the eggs hatch, hungry little larvae start eating away at the plant’s rhizome root system.
So no, my Aphthona lacertosa watercolor doesn’t look exactly like the real thing. But the real thing has been rewriting a 130-year-old mistake. Funny thing about ecological messes — they arrive as an accident and leave as an afterthought. Most people will never know how this one’s been handled. Until now.
More stories of insects (in art), my curious, creative entomologist friend:
What Is It About Stink Bugs: What are they, do they have non-human predators, and what are they doing in my house?
Just Dancing In The Dark: I was tempted to call this piece “Turn Off Your Damn Porch Lights So I Can Find Me a Lover,” as light pollution is a huge problem for these magical creatures.
The Hide Beetle: A fuzzy bear of an insect that brings to mind Maurice Sendak’s “Where The Wild Things Are,” and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. But this beetle has been helping humans for hundreds of years, in more ways than one.
