Without UPS, It Isn’t Easy to Get the Bugs Out

VENTURA — The Teamsters strike against United Parcel Service is really starting to bug Jan Dietrick.

Dietrick is general manager of Rincon-Vitova Insectaries Inc., which supplies growers around the country with ladybugs, green lacewings and other beneficial insects to help eradicate crop-munching pests.

The problem is, Dietrick’s company uses UPS to ship its bugs. If Dietrick’s insects don’t absolutely, positively get where they’re supposed to go overnight or soon thereafter, they, well, keel over and die. Or else they hatch and begin to eat each other.

Picture this: A package promising thousands of voracious predatory insects, delayed too long, could arrive carrying one fat satiated bug.

So Dietrick is getting creative, scrambling to find new ways to unload the creepy crawlers. She is negotiating with an armored truck firm--which usually delivers nothing but cash to and from banks--to transport her bugs.

“I was walking by and saw their sign and decided I’d at least ask,” she said. “They’re considering doing a couple dozen boxes per week.”

Dietrick is scouting other alternatives as well.

“I dashed down to Kinko’s with a few boxes of our predatory mites yesterday, because I know they have a regular FedEx pickup time,” she said. “They took a few.

“We’ve also found a local flower delivery company that’s helping us out with some of our California deliveries.”

Some companies, though, are squeamish about ferrying cargo with six legs.

Cute little ladybugs are one thing, she said. “But some people don’t love the idea of delivering live insects, like predatory mites.”

* CONTRACT VOTE URGED: About 20 UPS workers criticized the union for not letting them vote on a contract proposal. B1