Bugs to the rescue!

[cReAtIoN gRoAnS]

Was watering the other day and noticed a rainbow of pale green swarms erupting from my garden....looked closer and saw hundreds of Green lace wing larva. The beautiful rainbow was ....well what else...green lace wings! Guess they appreciated my aphid problem.

I must have thousands of them in the garden. I was pretty pumped...till I found out that the squash bugs killed my blue hubbards. :mad:

Had to rip em out.....I lost that battle...man...if only green lace wings ate squash bugs....I'd be good then.

HOw is everybody else holding out in the great battle of the bugs???

Interested to know your conditions....

Later!

Chad

[lovetogarden]

I got lucky this year. The wet weather encouraged quite a few toads to take up residence in my garden. My boys and I also hung up a lot of bird house gourds this year and there is always a robin or two checking out the garden.
So far so good.

[boston]

Same here.......so far so good. Not many bugs.

[bluelacedredhead]

Cucumber beetles and Squash Vine Borers are in abundance this year. But I've got lots of potato plants and haven't seen any evidence of potato beetles, so considering myself fortunate on that level. We can't keep potato dust on the shelves at work..so somebody's got them!
We have a large population of eastern bluebirds and barnswallows, but they are too busy eating mosquitos to help me in the garden. And all the starlings do is eat my plants :mad:

[Mary]

So far I haven't seen potato bugs, thats a blessing. I do have aphids on my turnips, haven't noticed any other bugs, but I don't have squash or melons planted.I have marigolds and petunias planted around my potatoes and beans,thought I would try that method to see how it goes.The birds eat the large marigolds and leave the small ones.The deer love my snow peas and maybe a rabbit ate my lettuce, but I still had several pickings of the peas and the lettuce so I'm not to upset.I saw or read where you could cut up a potato about a half inch thick, push a stick through it and bury the potato and stick leaving the stick up so you could find it, wait two or three weeks, pull up the stick and the grubs and pest in the ground would come with up with the potato,I think spring time is when you would do it.I haven't tried this, seems you would have to have a lot of potatoes, and maybe the potato would rot with all the rain we have here.I feel no matter what we do we will have bugs or animals in the garden.I just want to have a organic garden so plant a lot and share until I find a solution.

[Lavandula Girl]

I have jumping spiders (Phidippus audax) in my garden beds, doing a lot of dirty work for me. I praise them every day, except today, when one got between my shorts leg and my thigh and bit HARD.... ow! That one met an unfortunate demise! (And my children got to tell me I used a bad word,( or seven or eight of them!) which makes them laugh. I've got lacewings and lady beetles, too. I also have a little flying thing I've never seen before, and have been unable to get a photo of - about the size of a lacewing, but looks like a bright white ball of fluff with wings. If Dr. Suess was alive, I'd say he drew it.... does anyone know what it might be?

[johno]

You know, generally speaking, I've been pretty lucky this year. But I did catch (well, tried to catch...) a squash vine borer fluttering around my lemon squash yesterday. They are really kind of beautiful for a harbinger of doom.

I am recovering from a serious neck surgery and am not allowed to do much in the garden right now except water and SQUISH BUGS! Finally got over the willies from using my bare fingers, maybe that has something to do with my good luck with bugs this year... By the way, fold a leaf over blister beetles when hand squishing them... Also, sometimes I hand squish an occasional squash blossom full of cucmber beetles; make sure there's not a bee inside...

Honestly, I think it's just a lucky year. But I did try a couple of new strategies this spring, namely planting lots more flowers than usual and adding a water garden to attract reptiles and amphibians and beneficial insects. Worked like a charm, just don't forget the goldfish!

[lovetogarden]

johno,

So sorry about the neck injury. I 'll say a prayer for you.

I bet that water garden made a difference. Eventually we want to add a large one to our yard, but for now I leave out shallow containers of water and turned over pots for shelter. Since my toad population has increased, my squash bug problem is down to nil. Also, I added a lot of native flowers around my home,
and the "experts" are right on target when they say natives attract the benificials.

[johno]

Thanks lovetogarden.
johno

[Buglady]

You sure they were lacewings? Lacewings are laid on stalks in small groupings on things like leaves, side of your house, or sticks but not on the ground. Also being they are so highly predaceous they typically do not all hatch at once... if they did they would eat all their brothers and sisters. I never find large groupings of the larva unless i am doing a release of the larva and then they disperse. here is a link with some green lacewing information

http://www.bugladyconsulting.com/lacewings.htm

Is it possible that you had a pest insect that hatched?

[cReAtIoN gRoAnS]

Buglady,

Thanks for your concern but nope. I know a lacewing when I see one....and their larva are everywhere. The same thing is present with my ladybeetles...they are everywhere too. This year I have more beneficials than ever. I guess the organics are paying off. But they are most assuredly lacewings. Not a bit of doubt.


Thanks!

Chad

[Buglady]

Also FYI adult green lacewings do not feed on aphids... only the larva are predatory.

and don't get bit by the larva, they are very painful!!!!!!!!!

I have found even with pesticide usage lacewings are one of the first beneficials to return to an area. They seem to have a higher tolerance to pesticides then predatory wasps, flies and mites.

[cReAtIoN gRoAnS]

I knew about the larva eating the aphids.....but never gotten bit by em. Have to watch ou to for that...course been a bee keeper most of my life and have been stung millions of times so I am sure it is not worse than that!!!

Thanks for the heads up!

Chad

[Buglady]

Yes.. much worse the bee sting. I keep honey bees and bumble bees.... would pick them over lacewing and orius bites any day..... so I NEVER pick the larva up with my hands ... I always keep them on leaves on in containers when working with them. But did find a brown lacewing this morning :)

Also I have been looking at plants to attract them in. I have been much more successful attracting in predatory flies using plant material. Next I am going to try some compounds on sticky traps and see what I get. I am hoping they arrive today.

[Buglady]

L girl,
For your white fluffy insects I think I would need to see them, I would not want to guess. Woolly aphids? adelgids? psyllids ?

For the rudbeckia, I have never done work with it for root-knot so don't know. But also I think if it worked you would see a lot of rudbeckia grown in tomato fields.

Do you have root knot now?

[Lavandula Girl]

Several studies on the rudbeckia connection, and it is being trialed in Ct and NY. I've seen the study results on some preliminary trials, and they are really good. No, I don't have root knot. I was hoping that someone knew of a similar good result for any other cover crop. I have a neighbor who is inundated with squash borers. I figure it will be just a matter of time until they kill all his plants, and notice mine. My thought was to use a crop cover in a bed to prevent the squash borers before the squash are planted. Since the eggs are laid in the soil, and can overwinter, I was looking for a jump start. as to the fluffy bug in post #6 - it's not adelgid for sure, and if it's a wooly aphid it's a monstrous frankenstein one. I'll look up the other, and see if I can find pics. Thanks for the info!

[Buglady]

ok.. now you lost me.. "the benefit of rudbeckia as a protection from root knot nematodes" what does that have to do with squash borers?

[Buglady]

oh and who is doing the work on the rudbeckia ? and what is the focus of the study?

[Lavandula Girl]

The people doing the experiments are associated with: NERA (Northeastern Regional Association of State Agricultural Experiment Station Directors) and are looking specifically for non- chem solutions for agricultural issues, while maintaining high yield. Here's a quote from the study marked NE-171, re: rudbeckia and nematode controls.


"(CT) Meloidogyne hapla can be
spread in bare-root herbaceous perennial propagation
material and may be difficult to control once established
in new fields or in the landscape. Root pruning of
bare-root plants was previously demonstrated to reduce
spread and establishment of M. hapla. Planting M.
hapla-resistant plants such as Rudbeckia and Aster
into pots infested with M. hapla populations
virtually eliminated the nematodes after 2-6 months of
growth, demonstrating the potential of integrating
sanitation and resistance for management of M. hapla
in perennials."

My original question, (in the PM I said this) was if you were aware of any other plants that have similar benes, but in re: squash borers. I'd be interested in scientific studies, and also in anecdotal info. Thanks!

[Buglady]

ok.. now I understand a little more of what you were saying. but I don't know of any other plants, I know that using entomopathogenic nematodes reduces they egg laying of root knot nematodes and you can see some suppression.

for the squash borers, I don't work with them so I don't know. Sorry.

[Lavandula Girl]

Thanks BugLady! I was just hoping, since you have some experience with bugs. The studies are ongoing, but I think squash borers are probably pretty far down on the list of pests to study. I'm hoping that crop rotation will help some - so far only a couple of the adults have shown up in my garden, but I may be singing a different tune in a couple of weeks! Like I said my neighbor's squash was decimated, and I'm thinking the little !#%**#! will be looking for a new eatery soon. Again, thanks for your input.

[goldpearl]

If it wasn't so hot outside I'd be hunting squash bugs and eggs right now. I enjoyed reading your website buglady. Maybe I'll learn something.
I am going to try planting mustard after my squash this year. Mustard might fumigate the little buggers that overwinter in the soil, might help with squash borers, too? I will try anything!
I guess as long as I keep fighting, they can't win this war! I have been told to plant squash after June 1st. I will plant some again next year as a trap crop so they don't find my new garden. Someone also said plant onions in your squash beds.

[onmyknees]

I have been fighting a bug on my squash shield shaped brown in colorless than 1/2" long as adult eggs on the underside of leaves red hard to remove about the size of a ball pint the young are pale grey green. I used the weak tea with a little soat which does seem to help control the newly hatched but not the adults I started looking because I had several zuccini turn yellow and shrivel up trying to keep the eggs removed and hand pick or squash the adults and any young I can find. I have found a ladybug like insect more dark orange than red with black spots on everything any idea about this one is it a beneficial?

[Lavandula Girl]

that first one's a squash bug - ugly little thing, huh? if you aren't going to use chemicals, picking is your best bet, honestly. the second one may just be friend lady beetle, so that's a good reason not to use chems! there are a few pests that masquerade as lady beetles, though - can you post pics for us to see? re: the squash bug, if you squish him, he stinks - when we pick them, we drop them in a jar of water with about 1/4 inch of veg oil on top. kills them just as well. (and I'm sure there's someone on the site that'll give you a tasty fritter recipe too ha ha ha!)