Squash bugs and svb beware-your days are numbered

SVB lays eggs everywhere. I am talking 4 years of experience.

I haven't planted any zukes or squash. The heat moved in before I got it done. Actually, just remembered I planted two squash seeds and one is growing in an Earthbox.

In researching these Pests, I could see just wrapping a length of tulle around the base of the plants. Sort of billow or bunch it against the base of the plant where it comes out of the ground. It could still foil the Squash Moth from getting to the stem to lay eggs.

Just an idea...

I'm talking 20 yrs experience in TX and 15 in Cali. I used tulle ( I didn't keep it tacked down as well as I could have) but I've picked 10 +zukes this season along with yellow crookneck and scallop. So it seems to be working. That's the most squash I've ever gotten here and there is more setting. I've always read that they lay their eggs on or near the base of the plant so even if they laid the eggs on a leaf, the larva wouldn't do any damage.

Sounds like a good idea GG might as well give it a try. The squash aren't bothered by the heat, they love it.

Thanks, Lisa!

I'm encouraged to go ahead and plant at least one Tatume squash plant in my 24" ePlanter conversion. Two years ago when I was experimenting with eBuckets, I retro-fitted a very large 24" planter as an eSystem, complete with a self-watering reservoir in the bottom.

The first thing I planted in it was a zucchini which grew beautifully until it was killed by a SVB. I hadn't even heard of this pest at the time (a total newbie), so, I had no clue why that beautiful plant just up and died, almost overnight. Now, I know what likely happened!

Also, it will be much easier for me to manage the plant in the large planter. And, I'll go ahead and bunch the tulle around the base of the plant all the way round the inside of the planter. Even if the Squash moth lands on the tulle, she'll never burrow past it to get to the stem of the plant!

WOOOO HOOOO, this might actually work!!!!! (unless, of course, she decides to lay the eggs up much higher on the stem -- but, everything I've read and ya'll have reported says she likes to lay them closer to the soil)

Linda

Last year I killed two female SVB moths while they were laying their eggs in the soil and I am sure that is what they were doing as when I lifted them up Viola there was a little clutch of eggs which I mashed ..Seems to me they don't need acces to the plant only some soil fairly close to it Just saying

Thanks, Grits!

So, if I billow the tulle around the base of the plant on TOP of the soil, she can't reach it, huh?

KEWL!

I would make it cover the soil as well as the stem of the plant. I covered the whole bed with Tulle but as they grew bigger I had more important things to do and didn't tack the tulle down very well and the growing plants pushed the tulle off. I lost 2 plants,a third got hit but I removed the larva and the plant seems to be doing ok now. I just took a picture of the plants and will post it later.

Is there anyway you can cover the entire top of the container plant and all?

There sure is!

That's the other part of my strategy. Covering that entire container will be the easiest deterrent.

hrp50,
do you have a lot of female flowers?
I do have lots of male flowers and a few females ... I wonder why ...

Maybe your squash plants are from China?

LOLOL!

My squash seems to have put on mostly male flowers, too, but it's the only thing in my garden that is ROCKIN this summer.

If you fry things quickly, the added fat isn't really that much - olive oil or coconut oil are actually rather good for you. Grilling is still my favorite way to eat most any veggie, but fried squash blossoms are a delight. Pick them in the morning, when they're open!

I loooov zucchini fritti !!

I tried to skim this long thread for spinosad. Didn't see it, but apologies if I'm repeating. This is a relatively new biological control, and is sold under the name Captian Jack's Deadbug. It may be sold under other names too. I had good luck with it last year on squash bugs. It works both by ingestion and contact. I think it probably only works by contact on the smallest of those awful things. I haven't been plagued by borers, so no word on that.

In my skim I did see someone ask about plastic mulch. I used that on most of my veggie garden, but not on squash, because the squash bug adults like to lurk under the plastic.

That's normal to have more make flowers especially when they first start to bloom. The male flowers take less energy to produce and alert the pollinators that flowers are ready to be pollinated. If you do a search you will get a ton of hits. Its just the way nature works.

LAS14,
Thanks for that info on Spinosad and squash bugs, I was wondering if it was effective against them, it seem Spinosad is just what I am looking for, worth a try anyhow I think.

I ordered some Captain Jack's Deadbug last fall and I just sprayed some on my squash plants, but the directions don't say a word about squash bugs.

LAS, I use silver mulch, which definitely seems to deter SVBs. But you're right, it does provide a haven for SBs.

Drthor, one day I will have to come visit you so that I can brush up on my Italian, and my veggie growing skills. I'll even cook. I worked in several decent Italian restaurants, but my best dish is still fettuccine carbonara with zucchini fritti.
Or my nonna's bolognese "Sunday gravy", as we call it, but not much fresh garden stuff goes in there unless I can start to improve my luck with carrots. :)

Nola,
Whas' up with your carrots? They're pretty easy. What kind did you try, and what trouble did you have?

Linda, I tried a few varieties in late fall/early spring. They seemed to put on growth for a week and then just fizzled out. It's our first year in this house, but I've figured out 3 things:
- The soil was just sludge from the bayou, it hadn't been gardened since before Katrina - it's basically now a double-dug "container" with new soil and compost ladled in.
- the neighbors had been trying to kill some climbing vines with Roundup, and it was running from the roof into the garden.
- the bugs had a mix of delights, including an "empty" swimming pool next door, and the other neighbors had been using heavy pest control for termites in their trees.

So I'm thinking earthboxes soon - it is tough to get things growing at all in here, but I've been composting and turning over and digging. I figure the carrots and radishes that vanished are at least helping the soil to get healthy again!

Gymgirl, I have a LOT of trouble with carrots. I've tried home-made seed tape and lots of other things; I think mostly they just need more water to get going than I typically offer them. But this year, with all the rain, I'm getting a fairly thick-looking crop, so we'll see how that ends up. On the other hand the shallot seeds I planted haven't sprouted at all...

Ah, but here's the Squash Vine That Ate New Orleans! I just spotted the first baby squash on her this morning. Yep, pulling over the "trellis" and laughing. I swear she grows a foot every time I look. Some of the leaves are the size of a waitress tray.



This message was edited Jun 20, 2013 10:11 AM

Go ahead, rub it in. We don't care!

What kind of squash is that? It looks like some of the growth I've seen here on my winter squash in past years...

It's a cushaw - this variety is a LA native, but there's lots of kinds:
http://davesgarden.com/guides/articles/view/1673/

the flowers are huge, too, about as big as my hand.

Don't be too jealous, you should be able see the depressed, spindly tomatoes behind it. (sad trombone)

If anyone wants some seeds, I'll save some, or Baker Creek has several varieties. They're supposed to be good for the south and super bug-resistant.

This message was edited Jun 20, 2013 10:26 AM

Super bug resistant sounds great to me right now, how do they taste. Please show pics if you can when they mature.

I've grown cushaw. The taste is good, and makes great pumpkin pies. Alas, they are so large that a lot goes to waste in my 1 person household. Occasionally I can several quarts of cubes (NOT puree, which isn't safe to can) but never use all of them. Since I live alone, I don't even make pies much anymore.

I'm growing Upper Ground Sweet Potato (C. moschata) this year, and the hotter it gets the faster it grows and the bigger the leaves get. It's a monster already and it's only June. I have no idea what I'll do with all the vines... I guess I'll trail them over the fence and let them grow out into the field, and if the rabbits nibble on them, oh well.

G_g,
Just remember to thin out your carrots to get the full size you want. Crowding does absolutely nothing for them. I learned the hard way.

But, I also learned that if you put your finger on one carrot to hold it in while you pull the one next to it that you're thinning out, that first one has a good chance of growing on to full size!

But, the best method of all is to sow them in a straight line, and space them as evenly as possible from the beginning -- this makes thinning a bit easier.

I think it is the mark of a good gardener to be able to plant carrots without getting them too crowed, I planted mine way to closely last year and ended up with all tiny little carrots. So I was determined this year not to repeat that mistake, so I planted a single row and started with tweezers dropping the seeds, that lasted about a minute. Then I just took a few between my fingers and rolled them out spacing them, well that did not feel like enough seeds (I said feel because I could not see the darned things) so I went back and made another pass, then added just a few more for good measure. Yep, carrots are way too close and I have lots of tiny carrots.

Now, I understand carrot seed tapes!

Which actually aren't a bad idea, if you have the time to sit there and make little Elmer's glue dots on a piece of TP, LOL!

Hmmmmmmm....not a bad idea at all, really.....

I did actually did seed tapes one year, and I thought it was terrific, till the squirrels found them.

This message was edited Jun 20, 2013 4:11 PM

I sowed my carrots thickly because usually nothing comes up. Thanks for the tip on how to thin without pulling up the plant you want to keep, though!

I just cut back my cilantro and sprinkled the stalks around my squash. That'll confuse the buggers!!

Even though I've found Spinosad effective, I still scrape off any eggs I find. They're very hard, so it's not icky without gloves.

The problem I've always had is that my plants grow so lush that after a while I just can't check the undersides of every leaf, and that's when the critters get ahead of me. But this year I've put in far fewer plants and I'm hoping that will make it easier for me to keep checking.

I've noticed this year, but I think it's always been this way, I just never noticed that my vining (winter squash) doesn't seem to be bothered by the SVB or the squash bugs. I have spaghetti squash growing right next to the summer squash and so far there isn't a bug on them. I can't say the same for the summer squash. Has anybody else noticed this?

All of my squash is bothered by squash bugs - winter and summer. I've grown types that are supposed to be fairly resistant to them but they succumb just as quickly as anything else.

I went an checked again today and the summer squash had a few squash bugs but none on the spaghetti squash, weird

I will direct sow pumpkin seeds around the first of July, like I do very year. I've never had a problem with those either. But I never thought about it until now. I have no idea why.

So in July 7th I became aware of the SVB in the stems of some plants. Never saw any signs of eggs, only saw a moth once at that time. Have since seen the moth many times and even managed to kill one.

Lots of frass and wilted leaves so I injected the stems with Spinosad.

These are pictures today of the stems of my first three (oldest) zucchini plants. You can see those stems are a mess from the borer damage but no new frass.

Part of their problem was that they had come down with horrible powdery mildew more than a week before I found the borers. Read that you should cut off affected leaves. Big mistake. I did but it did not help. Mildew kept spreading. So it took three times of spraying with the Neem to stop/control the mildew. Now I just spray all the squash with the Neem.

These two plants are my original two yellow zucchinis. Also hit badly by borers but stems are in ok shape and they are recovering nicely. Nice new green growth coming.