I got the impression from the photo that it was an old empty one, but I could be wrong. The eggs are laid in autumn and the eggs hatch in spring. If the case appears to have open holes, then they are long gone, remembering that the case holds many, many eggs, up to hundreds in fact. Unfortunately, if it still had eggs in it, they may be compromised by the removal from the wall.

Oh, boy do I know where you are coming from, Scotland1! I live on the coast of North Carolina, and they are bad here too. I think what we have are called American roaches...not quite as big as palmettos, but close. The only thing good about our cold winters (short lived) is that they arent around very much. I get my house exterminated 4 times a year, HOWEVER, this past fall season, I bought Raid Bug Barrier. It said it "keeps bugs out", so I gave it a try. I spray (and it has an option to spray a pretty far distance with a steady stream...so if a bug is crawling up the wall around the corners at the ceiling. As they do here!) Anyway, I spray outside on my patio, around doors and windows, and even on the house. I spray inside just a little where I suspect they might enter. Ever since I started this, I have seen only two bugs, and they were about to kill over. I will never be out of this stuff.

well thank you, ken_adrian!! I was having quite a bit of trouble with flea beetles: they seem to be somewhat under control now, but yes there is quite a bit of damage... mostly on the leaves that have been there a while. I know I also have an aphid problem, so I've been trying to make my garden a ladybug haven which seems to be working! I found some ladybug eggs on a few plants! This has all been pretty fascinating to me! I LOVE the patterns of the eggs in these pics. I've had a pretty rough time over the past two years with organic gardening... last year we lost all our cabbage family to those nasty cabbage worms. =( so I'm trying to really learn good vs. bad insects in attempt to let them do their natural thing! We have a good few little frogs out there too... but I'm wanting to put in a water feature at some point to encourage them to come on over!

I planted one little plant about two and a half, maybe three years ago, at the most. I wanted so much to look over it's spreading since it's such a good bloomer, but my friend's experience woke me up to the fact that I had no time to loose if I wanted have control of that planting bed. I did a quick search on the internet to see if anyone else had noted this propensity and didn't find anything. Usually Dave's site is good for that, but there was not much about it there. I just now looked at Dave's Garden again and while I don't see any "negatives", upon reading through the comments I see that a couple of people in Texas give a hint of possible problems: "Verbena rigida happily grows in lawns and roadside easements in Central and Coastal Texas. I've seen it thriving in soggy ditches and hard-pan road embankments. Its tuberous roots enable it to survive drought conditions and may go dry-dormant. With regular watering, this plant may spread rapidly but if you like deep purple verbena flowers for months on end and butterflies, you probably won't mind the occasional need to pull up stray rhizomes." This 'neutral' comment does post a 'warning': "I do very much like the purple display this plant makes, which pretty much never stops, except in the dead of winter, which by the way does not actually do much harm to this plant in zone 8. It is indestructible once it gets started, just some dead top growth again in the winter. Now on to the reason for this post. Warning for Verbena rigida. In zone 8 this plant is winter hardy and will spread with runners (lots), suckers (again, lots), and seed (few). It is very slow to start but after the first year be prepared to mow it down all around wherever you are trying to contain it, which it really can't be contained 100%. Mine came as seed with some other wildflower seed I ordered. Prolific bloomer and holds the blooms for a very long time, leaves are sharp to the touch and somewhat serrated."