Insects to Dye for

    When people generally think of insects and what they do for society, the general consensus is usually that they aren't doing much and if they are doing something it must be bad. The usual examples are termites eating homes, mosquitoes making life uncomfortable, caterpillars eating our garden, or wasps invading our back yard barbeques. Occasionally someone reminds us that we do have some beneficial insects, such as honey bees producing honey and pollinating our flowers. But in general, insects aren't viewed in a very economically or socially beneficial way.
    However, there are other insects besides honey bees that have been really useful for society. One of these lesser known insects is the cochineal bug. This bug (part of the True Bugs, or Hemiptera) is a flat, pancake-shaped insect that pretty much lives its life flat on a cactus, feeding all day. Below is a picture of a colony of them feeding on a cactus pad.

   They are usually covered with a powdery coating of wax, which is thought to help protect them from predators and drying out (biting a block of wax isn't exactly enticing to a predator!). All of these insects are females; males usually only live long enough to mate and fertilize eggs before dying. Males don't even live long enough to eat, and don't have mouths!
   So why are these little, flat bugs such a good thing? Well, since the 15th Century Mayans and Aztec peoples of Central America have been harvesting these insects for dye, or carmine. If you take your finger and press on one of these insects to squish it, they produce a deep red colored fluid (carmic acid causes the color), which is used for dye.

    Central Americans would collect these insects off of the cactus plants, dry them, and then mix the ground material with salts to extract the dye. The dye was so invaluable, in fact, that it was only second to silver as an export during the early Colonial Period. Only until artificial dyes were developed in the late 19th Century did it wane in popularity.

Cochineal-dyed wool

    These days use of the dye is making a comeback, mostly due to people moving back to natural dyes and products. In fact, there is a resurgent industry in South America to produce the dye and farm the insects, and is once again becoming an important industry. If you search around here in Oklahoma and Texas, you can sometimes find these insects feeding on own native cactus pads.

A large colony of insects

Cochineal is often used in cosmetics, foods, and other red-items due to its ability to stay red even under bright light and because it can mix with water.  Its also now more widely available at natural food stores as an alternative to artificial food coloring. One item I see it listed a lot is in Jello snack-packs. Here is a video about how its used in many foods for the red coloring.

   If you want to learn more, check out the Wikipedia page about the insects, their history, and their dye...and next time you see a cactus, take a closer look for another beneficial insect!