A randomized complete block design consisting of five replications of four treatments was deployed on June 15 in an untreated rice field at the Rice Experiment Station in Biggs, CA, USA. Treatments consisted of mosquito fish (Gambusia affinis), a combination of predatory beetles (three adult Laccophilus maculosus Say and two adults Tropisternus lateralis (Fabricius)), an untreated control, and the industry-standard pesticide (lambda-cyhalothrin) at a rate of 75.7 mL per ring. Gambusia utilized in this study were laboratory-reared to adulthood from stream populations and averaged roughly 4 cm (measured using calipers). Beetles were collected from light traps deployed at the Rice Experiment Station in Biggs, CA, USA, during spring months. Aluminum rings, 1 m 2 in area and 61 cm high, acted as experimental plots within the field in accordance with previous rice invertebrate research methods [35] (link)[36] (link)[37] (link). Aluminum rings are installed in dry rice fields prior to flooding using wooden stakes secured into the clay soil to hold their cylindrical shape. Clay soil is packed around the bottom of each aluminum ring to ensure study species are unable to immigrate or emigrate from each ring (Supplementary Material Figures S1-S3). The entire experiment occupied a 7 × 9 m grid in the field. Aluminum rings effectively captured TPS, preventing them from moving in or out of the ring. No TPS were added or removed from rings during the experiment; thus, this study embraces the full, natural spatial heterogeneity in TPS densities. Both L. maculosus and T. lateralis beetles are naturally occurring in rice fields throughout the season and are capable of flying in and out of aluminum rings. Five beetles were consistently observed in designated beetle treatment rings throughout the study, suggesting that none emigrated from the ring during our study. Rings were deployed in a research field that had a high-density population of TPS the previous season. Each ring was seeded with rice variety M206 at a commercial rate of 10.8 g/ring one day after flooding (DAF). Treatments were applied 2 DAF, with the exception of lambda-cyhalothrin, which was applied at a commercial rate (0.139 L/ha) prior to flooding. The number of surviving TPS per ring was recorded as 3, 5, 7, and 9 DAF.