aphid

/ˈeɪfɪd/

/ˈeɪfɪd/

Other forms: aphids

An aphid is a bug that's considered a pest by many gardeners. Aphids like to eat a variety of plants, including roses, lettuce, peaches, and grapes.

Aphids feed by sucking sap or liquid from a plant, and they can be quite destructive to a farmer's crop or a gardener's flower bed, because they reproduce quickly and efficiently. Several kinds of birds and spiders prey on aphids, and farmers use both chemical and biological insecticides to control them. The word aphid comes from the Modern Latin aphis, from 1758, although its origin isn't known.

Definitions of aphid

1. noun

   any of various small plant-sucking insects
   types:

   Aphis pomi, apple aphid, green apple aphid

   bright green aphid; feeds on and causes curling of apple leaves

   Aphis fabae, bean aphid, blackfly

   blackish aphid that infests e.g. beans and sugar beets

   greenfly

   greenish aphid; pest on garden and crop plants

   ant cow

   excretes a honeylike substance eaten by ants

   woolly aphid, woolly plant louse

   secretes a waxy substance like a mass of fine curly white cotton or woolly threads

   green peach aphid

   yellowish green aphid that is especially destructive to peaches

   pale chrysanthemum aphid

   important pest of chrysanthemums

   American blight, Eriosoma lanigerum, woolly apple aphid

   primarily a bark feeder on aerial parts and roots of apple and other trees

   Prociphilus tessellatus, woolly alder aphid

   attacks alders

   type of:

   louse, plant louse

   any of several small insects especially aphids that feed by sucking the juices from plants