Today for the first time since I began observing in 2021, there are no Speckled lacturas nor Spined soldier bugs. It has been 7-10 days since I last checked them due to weather and house guests.

A fairly comprehensive check today:
-Dark rover ants were active in large numbers on the plant with scale insects. The ants did not seem particularly interactive with the scale insects.
There is abundant new growth on most of the trees, but particularly on the two that were most heavily populated with the Lactura subfervens larvae. There are very few buds on any of the plants. I wonder if they will even bloom this year?