) is a soft bodied small to medium sized insect (10-20mm), there are dozens of species of green lacewings in North America and Canada (C. ornata, C. majuscula, C. californica). The green lacewing is a very delicate looking insect , the body is greenish to a pale yellow, with ten segments and no cerci, possessing compound eyes of a copper color. The antenna are threadlike or filiform and span the length of two thirds of the body. The delicate wings are clear with greenish veins, and are at least one quarter longer that the body, this observation is best used for deciphering the lacewing. For more intricate observations the front wings as well as the hind wings are similar in size and shape with the front wings possessing one radial sector, the subcosta and radial veins of the wings are not fused at the wing tip, unlike other geniuses and the costal cross veins are not forked. .
The life cycle of the lacewing is quite interesting as well, being that it is constantly metamorphosing from larvae to nymph, to the final adult stage. A female lays up to three hundred eggs over a period of three to four weeks, but often it does not survive that long in the field. Eggs can be found on slender white silk stalks hanging from the undersides of leaves, each species lay eggs in different types of groupings, some lay in a row, some in selective groups. The larva, commonly called an aphidlion, seizes and punctures its prey with long, sickle-shaped jaws, injects a paralyzing venom, and sucks out the body fluids. After feeding and growing to half of an inch in length during a two to three week period, the larva spins a spherical, white silken cocoon in which it pupates. The adult emerges in about five days through a round hole that it cuts in the top of the cocoon. The lacewing is most commonly found in the grass, weeds, trees and shrubs. An aphidlion is a voracious feeder and can feed on mites and a wide variety of soft-bodied insects, as well as each other if no other prey are available.
