So, do you think you had a fun afternoon? I spent mine picking bagworms off of a bunch of humongous arbor vitae we have in our yard.

This is the first time I have ever added a picture to a post and it's a picture if bagworms of all things. I'm telling you, these little coccoon things may look innocent enough. In fact, they even look like little pine cones or just little dead branches. But inside of them? Look out! Inside will be this little black worm that is so ugly it's almost cute. (Someone said something like that about me in high school once but let's not dredge that up.) At some point, the female bagworms will lay hundreds of eggs inside of the coccoon and, the next spring, those hatch into more worms which are capable of stripping a shrub entirely clean of all vegetation.

These are hard things to get rid of. There is a particular time frame before they create coccoons when you can spray for them but, after that, you pretty much have to pick them off by hand and then squish or burn them so that they don't get spread somewhere else. I have been told that transporting them to be composted will still not get rid of them. The eggs will hatch and the worms will find something alive even there to feed upon.

Go look at your shrubs. The presence of worms represents an unhealthy and dangerous situation. They may look innocent ... they may even look cute ... but that is all deception. Pluck away the worms and get rid of them.

"You don't get wormy apples off a healthy tree, nor good apples off a diseased tree. The health of the apple tells the health of the tree. You must begin with your own life-giving lives. It's who you are, not what you say and do, that counts. Your true being brims over into true words and deeds." (Luke 6:43-45 MSG)