Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

All the ladybugs arrived alive. I had done some reading before I purchased them and had a bit of a plan in place to try to keep them around which worked fairly well. First, you need to plan and release them at dusk. We put ours in the refrigerator for awhile before releasing. This helped calm and slow them down, and it did not kill any. Then before I opened the mesh package they are in, I sprayed them with a 50/50 mixture of juice and water. The instructions I saw said to do pop and water, but we didn't have any pop. The sugar supposedly helps keep their wings stuck together for a time, so they don't fly off right away. If they stick around overnight, the idea is that they will lay eggs and start eating the pests, reducing the need to find a new home. We released them by pouring out some on the different plans we wanted them on, and they stayed on those plants. We only saw one or two that tried to fly away, and we gently knocked them out of the air into the targeted plants. Then we put some raisins that we soaked in a bit of water on the plants we put the ladybugs on. Supposedly that attracts them. The next morning, we had plenty of ladybugs in and around our garden. Our pest problem decreased dramatically. Of course, as the pest problem went down, the ladybugs had less food and started to spread out. We didn't feel the need to try and continually supply them food to keep them around. After a couple weeks, we still see some in the garden, and the vegetables are thriving again. I am not an expert and don't know which things above did and did not help. I would encourage you to try some of them if you are worried about the ladybugs flying away too soon after release.