Bad Day

[virgil flowers]

I put out about 28 tomato plants 5 days ago in a very deep soft clay soil garden. Yesterday I had to wade mud up to my ankles picking potato bugs off the little guys. Usually I dont have a garden planted this early. That is the earliest by a month that I have encountered colorado beetles. So the warm weather was not really all a good thing. This morning they look bug free. Gonna watch them like a hawk from now on til it dries up.

[Shadesz]

Sorry to hear about that good luck!

[virgil flowers]

I now have 38 tomato plants, 2 hills of cukes(holes in the leaves), 2 ichiban eggplants, a row of half runners and corn coming thru the ground. I looked next door and the neighbors potatoes have a fair number of colorado beetles on them. The mystery is solved. I am still picking and squishing but they have eaten the tender top out of several tomato plants. I am getting ready for my foot mud treatment just before dark. Its rained all day and I will sink to my ankles but I cant just let them win. Maybe they will be defeated by time for me to put out my squash and bell peppers. I also have four baby Hull blackberry plants out there but so far the bugs have by passed those. Hallelujah!

[redneckplanter]

good luck..............

[VA Gardener]

Are you picking off the adult beetles or the larvae? Don't forget all those eggs on the undersides of the leaves.

[Ezzrider]

I feel for ya. This has been by far my worst year for bugs in my "spring" gardens. Grasshoppers, aphids and pickle worms abound! We did have a very warm "winter" if you call it a winter here in Florida.

[virgil flowers]

I have been staking tomatoes all day and have only seen a couple bugs. I think my perseverance won the day. I now have 69 tomato plants and have staked all but ten. Forty of those are heirloom cultivars bragged up on one of three diff garden sites that I visit daily. I have black, red, orange, yellow and pink. I have big, medium and 3 diff cherry tomatoes and am eager to start tasting about 15 varieties that I am growing for the first time. I replanted bare spots in my Silver King and set some Big Bertha peppers in containers on my driveway. I've waited all winter for this and am really having a great time. Hope all you guys are also.

[bluelacedredhead]

Congrats on a job well done. I'm sure that your hard work paid off.
Lovely to hear that you are enjoying your garden.

[Train]

Originally Posted by VA Gardener

Are you picking off the adult beetles or the larvae? Don't forget all those eggs on the undersides of the leaves.

Ya

And if it ever stops raining you might
try dusting with diatomaceous earth.
Not saying it will stop them but it might.
DE works on so many critters that I
think it may on your Beatles too.
You will need a pest pistol too.
Favorable to us is that DE is organic.
Train

[virgil flowers]

think I got lucky. Its past the time for the eggs to have hatched and I have no more pests. I think I spotted them and by picking off immediately I avoided the hatch. Thanks for the heads up on the organic pesticide. If you read extensively about this insect you will find that it is able to build an immunity to any thing tried to date. Commercial growers swith chems every two yrs to keep em guessing.