Live and let live if it's not harming anything.

I found a solitary grasshopper in my raised bed and killed it based on their reputation of devouring plants.

Maybe we've got different grasshoppers here in Michigan but I see lots of grasshoppers every year and never see them cause any damage. But then I've also got lots of grass and weeds they can eat plus plenty of spiders and mantises to keep their populations from exploding.

Rodney

Unless it is a starving elephant, one of anything is unlikely to eat enough to harm your garden all that much. :)

Grasshopper is one of the rare insect type that can evolve without going in pupa stage and long after its basic shape is determined. For most insects to grow wings they have to go into pupa stage but not grasshopper. It is quite an awesome insect really if not for its plant eating habit.

Unless proven guilty, I usually give unknown insects the benefit of the doubt that they are innocent... but once they are proven guilty, thats a different story.

I'd leave it alone if its not doing any harm.

Depends on the pest. Squash bugs are guilty on sight.

Here, squash bugs and grasshoppers are automatically guilty. There is no way I will ever get them all but if there is one, there is likely someone nearby for the grasshopper to mate with. In my area, grasshoppers are a huge problem them, especially in the fall when they eat any new, tender growth. They get into the low tunnels where I try to start fall plants and eat all of the newly emerged seedlings. For me, they are definitely guitly on sight.

Ceth....lots of insects skip the pupal stage....it's called incomplete metamorphosis. It's quite simple ; these insects simply change a little bit everytime they shed their exoskeleton. It's only at the final instar that their wings and sex organs are fully formed.

Examples of insects that undergo incomplete metamorphosis include grasshoppers, crickets, katydids, earwigs, cockroaches, the true bugs (stink bugs and all of their kin), and many more.

Sunny, seeing ONE grasshopper is cause for celebration! I'd just leave it alone and let it become food for a bird, toad, snake, squirrel, mantis, or dragonfly.

Thank you rhizo for the info. I really appreciate it.

The grasshopper lives :-) Still hanging out in my pepper plant, which I thought for sure would be spent by now but continues to pump out more jalapenos than we will ever, ever eat... Perhaps this particular grasshopper is a lucky one?!?

The grasshopper lives :-) Still hanging out in my pepper plant, which I thought for sure would be spent by now but continues to pump out more jalapenos than we will ever, ever eat... Perhaps this particular grasshopper is a lucky one?!?