Spotted lanternflies are back this year despite the best efforts of the affected states to eradicate the invasive insect, writes Asmaa Elkeurti for The New York Times.

This year the mantra is the same: see it, squish it, report it. The only alternative is their spread, which needs to be avoided at all costs.

Currently, the bug is in its early nymph phase, when the small insects are dotted with white spots. They develop their iconic gray and red coloring when they reach adulthood in July.

Stomping or squashing of spotted lanternflies has been strongly encouraged by state officials, even if their invasion was not as costly as originally envisioned.

According to Julie Urban, an evolutionary biologist in the entomology department at Penn State, a report published in 2019 by the Penn State College of Agricultural Sciences that estimated that spotted lanternflies could cause an annual loss of $325 million in Pennsylvania alone, had turned out to be overblown.

However, the state’s grapevines were heavily affected, which caused the growers in Pennsylvania to record reduced yields each year since the bug’s arrival.

Read more about spotted lanternflies in The New York Times.

Meet the vigilantes trying to wipe out the spotted lanternflies.