grub problem - DE? help.

i hope you're not being mean to me... i've always liked you...
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Not at all. I'm sympathetic.

VICTOR IS SYNTHETIC!?

Amy - Good luck! I think I would have thrown in the trowel!! You really must love gardening.

well, i did one big section over the weekend - thankfully with help from DH for a day, and i dug through that area today and found about 8 living grubs in around 6 sq. feet. Some dead ones too.
It was a really depressing, awful couple of days though. I need to do more areas this weekend, but at least i can get my mums planted.
And Mrs. Landlord asked DH this morning about milkyspore. i printed out info about it, and about nematodes.

so there is hope!

on the down side, i am finding mole tunnels that weren't there a month ago, and a few dead plants because of it. i also need a bunch of topsoil to replace what came up with the mulch (and to fill the tunnels...)

so, it seems that the DE is effective for grubs, although it is too soon to tell how effective in the long run.

thanks to everyone for your help, advice, and encouragement!

amy
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amethystsm . . .considering your garden problems (all of which can be corrected in time so don't despair) I don't enjoy asking this but are you sure moles killed those plants?

My garden, 30' x 40', is riddled with mole tunnels. Not one of 51 tomato plants, 24 pepper plants, parsely, onions, basil etc..etc..have died because of mole activity. A lily/impatiens/nasturtium garden is likewise unaffected. After a rain, the moles have gone crazy digging new tunnels. I've had to stake up peppers than were falling over because moles had excavated the dirt under them. But the peppers continued producing without a gasp. When I water the tomato plants, the water often goes down huge mole holes and I have to shovel in new dirt.

What you may have are moles and voles. The latter use mole tunnels to do their damage. They can be controled too. There was a vole outbreak a decade ago in our state. Here is an article from the Connecticut Gardener which tells how to handle them:

http://conngardener.com/samples/article2.html

That poor woman!! I would be crying and saying UNCLE, UNCLE!! Sounds like you are determined to win this battle!! Woman I hear you roar

Hi Amy, I have not been back on the thread for a while so firstly, let me say sorry IF you felt I had offended you in any way with my comments re sterile gardens, that was never an intention, I think I can place hand on heart and say I always try to encourage people to have a go at gardening, to be patient with their plants and to stick at it, as I have been gardening since childhood, I try to give others the benefit of some of the experience gained by my efforts, and not to take them over the carpet, gardeners are usually friendly, kind and full of encouragement and that has been my sole intention, so again let my offer my apologies to you.
I have just read through all the thread and boy, you do have a problem, my advice to you for future troubles of the grubs, insect or crawling kind is, if it moves fast, it is a good guy as these creatures need speed to act as predators to other insects/grubs etc, but if it is slow moving, then it is normally a plant or root eater, a bad guy. My Dad taught me that and over the years, it sure has worked out to be true.
As for your grubs, I was unable to see them at close range other than they are white, soft and look legless so far, from that I would say they are the young of some type of either beetle or perhaps will mature into a flying insect once mature, the other thing that could be a possibility, because you have such an infestation of ants, and they need to feed and take food back to their nests, the white grubs could be connected, it could be that the ants are working side by side the grubs, in my garden, where I have greenfly on any of my roses for instance, I have noticed that I have lots of ants, these feed not off the greenfly, but the sugary substance that the greenfly excrete as waste, I can see you have a huge infestation to deal with and it will not be an easy task nor quick to get under control, so patience will be needed along with hard work, dont know if this will help you but here's what I had to do in similar situation, I used a flame gun, I believe you folks call them torch blowers etc, it is a large petrol gun that throws out a powerful flame, anyway, I had to constantly turn over the soil and as I did so, my husband waved the flame all over the soil, this killed off most of the grubs much faster than any other method, maybe you could even rent one of these flame things for a day of so, you dont need to hold it in the one position for any length of time as these grubs and ants burn even when the flame is about a foot away, but you keep turning the soil over till you see no more grubs as you burn them, next day, go out and do the same again as you will have missed one or two, you wont do any harm to the soil, even where you have got the wood chippings, this will burn the wood and if it gets burned through, it turns the wood into charcoal and that is good for the soil, it sweetens it and stops the soil turning sour. I suspect the mulch that had been on top of the soil has a lot to do with the soil being so infested, normally with wood mulching, you rake it to turn it every so often or as you dig the soil, it gets turned into the earth and it composts down so grubs dont get the chance to build up, when they do, it is usually the dead or dying wood that the bugs feed off and not the plant roots, your soil from the picture looks really wet, so one can only assume the grubs like these conditions, dark, damp and uncultivated, you will need to be careful which plants you place there if the soil holds onto water as most plants cant grow in these conditions, Mum's especially dont like there feet constantly wet or they suffer from what is called foot rot or root rot and will stunt their growth, they also, like most plants, like a fertile richer soil with added compost/animal manure added, this needs to be well rotted before used. Could it be possible to hold off planting this year as we come into winter/autumn, and work on clearing your beds of all the grubs and letting the soil air off now that you have removed the wood chip mulch, that way you will get better results next year and save you a lot of money on plants that will be ruined with the infestation you have right now. If you have already bought your plants, could you plant them into large containers to give you a colourful show till you can improve your soils texture and nutrients and air that all plants need to grow properly, I would hate you to be so despondent about the returns you get from the borders right now as you seem to be so keen to get a garden established, also by waiting till next spring, using the winter months to be better prepared for your planting ideas will give you the time to go along to your library/book store to search out books on soil types, landscaping, different plants needs and will also have a section on pests and diseases within the books, especially for beginners gardening, these books are expensive at times, but add them to your Christmas list etc. hope this helps in some way, OH forgot to say, I am not against chemicals as I do understand that for some people, it is the best way to go about the job, but felt it best to point out that to kill some things, it is at the expense of some others even birds who eat the poisoned bugs, but do remember, you can only garden to your own style, not to please anyone else, you will find that by the plants and beds you yourself plant up, it is your space, not for pleasing anyone else's ideas of what your garden should look like, so good luck, dont give up and you will eventualy enjoy the fruits of all you really hard work, once you get the basics right, the fun really begins and the pleasure is then all yours. Weenel.

So, i'd better jump in now since this got bumped and say:
the diatomaceous earth did NOT work.
It seemed like it might at first, but no.
Maybe the HGTV thing, in saying to use it in the spring, is really about killing the beetles, not the grubs. i dunno.

Landlords got - and applied - milky spore. Though i thought it needed to be watered in so i kept trying to since they didn't. But i don't have a sprinkler. And they put it EVERYWHERE equally, including areas of just mulch where there are no problems that i know of.

So, i dig grubs now. (i mean with a shovel, i absolutely DO NOT "dig" them!) And fill up tupperware containers for the birds to eat. Bees attack the grubs too, i don't know why. Freakyweird stuff.

I was seeing writhing grubs when i closed my eyes to sleep at night for a while.

Now i am debating the wisdom of some sort of grub-killer poison, at least in my garden area. It may be time for that. Nematodes would be great, but maybe it will be too cold for them and they cost SO much.

Thanks for all the help and advice so far. Maybe i can get more help at the RU tomorrow...

amy
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