Red Cotton Stainer

Description:

Dysdercus cingulatus is a species of true bug in the family Phyrrhocoridae, commonly known as the Red Cotton Stainer. It is a serious pest of cotton crops, the adults and older nymphs feeding on the emerging bolls and the cotton seeds as they mature, transmitting cotton-staining fungi as they do so. Dysdercus cingulatus grows to a length of 12 to 18 mm (0.47 to 0.71 in), but has a white collar and three black spots. It is closely related and very similar to Dysdercus koenigii, but D. cingulatus is slightly larger and the femora have varying amounts of black while D. koenigii has completely red femora. (Wikipedia)

Habitat:

The D. cingulatus shown here were spotted on Okra (Abelmoschus esculentus) in our vegetable garden.

Notes:

D. cingulatus is indeed a serious pest of cotton as pointed out in Wikipedia, and the same seems to be true for Okra. The specimens I pictured here are still relatively few in number, but in the vegetable season of 2017, our entire Okra crop was devastated by a massive infestation numbering in the thousands.