Stinky insects will awaken in SC soon to eat your plants. Here’s when and how to fight them

Just before we need to start worrying about the lawnmower sounds of cicadas, another pest will make an appearance in South Carolina, one that has been possibly overwintering in your attic.

The Brown Marmorated Stink Bug is coming to a vegetable garden or flower bed near you.

The ugly and, yes, stinky pest (when crushed) that came over from Asia in the 1990s will come out of its warm hiding place as early as March.

Bug experts have said South Carolina and other states have had an invasion of stink bugs in recent years as the climate has warmed.

The bugs won’t hurt you but they are serious about eating fruit trees, corn, garden vegetables and some ornamental plants. The adults gravitate to fruit, younger bugs also like leaves and stems.

All time favorite stink bug meals are peaches, apples, pears, pecans, tomatoes, peppers and sweet corn.

They were first seen in South Carolina in 2011 and now are everywhere, the Clemson Home and Garden Center said.

Soon, they will begin mating.

“Females may deposit nearly 500 eggs in masses of less than 30 over their lifetime, usually on the undersides of leaves,” Clemson says on its website.

And listen to this, they may have several generations in one season, which usually lasts until October.

Then they start trying to get in your house — windows, baseboards, attics and almost any empty space.

They also overwinter in dead standing trees with thick bark, like oaks and locusts.

Until the weather gets consistently in the 70s you may find stink bugs inside. If you do, vacuum them up, seal the bag and throw them out.

The Walgenbach Lab at North Carolina State University offers this for getting rid of them outdoors:

— Look for clusters of light green eggs, often laid in a triangle shape like billiard balls, on the undersides of leaves, and crush them.

— After hatching, neem oil sprays may suppress (but likely won’t eliminate) the nymph stages.

— Hand pick adults and submerse them into a bucket of soapy water, but they tend to drop off the plant to the ground when disturbed so they can be tough to capture.

— For severe infestations, you can spray with an organic botanical insecticide, such as Pyganic. But this may take out the good bugs, too.

Traps are a no go. Lots of testing and products on the market but the lab says they have so far been largely ineffective.