HELP...JAPANESE BEATLES HAVE ARRIVED!!!!

I was deadheading some echinacea because they had holes and were turning a lovely tan shade and came in contact with an ambush bug. I thought it was a lingerong beetle and grabbed it to give it the squish for eating my blooms and the little sucker bit me, twice, drew blood. Vicious little things. Okay so it was just defending itself or though it was lunch time but a nasty little sting to their nibble. Put him back on now deceased bloom and took his pic. I have found several of them on the echies and remove them usually if the flutterbys are out and about.

Never heard of them. He looks like he has to use the bathroom.

Too funny, he does!!!

Speaking of slugs they are huge here as well!

PS - The slug description Jax gave may help me lose a few pounds, twinkies will never look the same to me! ;)

I am so SICK of rain. Today it rained so hard and so long that in 30 min the rain was half way up the tires of cars parked on some of the streets in Albany!!

I've barely had to water the plants all summer. Seems like it's rained almost every day.

Certain areas got all the rain! Wish we had some of yours!

Clouds and far off thunder is as close as we got to the rain today. Showers all around, just not here.

I wish we could share the rain!!

Why is it either too much water or not enough? We're getting soaked AGAIN today- that's 7 straight days of rain, I think. BUT I had to water every day for the first 5 weeks of the growing season.
I am trying to be not so hard on myself- I can't keep up w/ weeds AND bugs this time of year. I won't do heavy spraying- we are within wetlands, and I don't want to harm birds, worms, or innocent insects in my zeal for flowers.
Yikes! Another big crack of thunder!!!

The rain is begining to rot, I meant really rot. We are getting it again and again and again. Brighter side tomorrow is looking good, but damage has already been done.

The problem is I anticipated a drought so I invested heavily in "self watering" containers; I bought 3 EBs, made 3 "tote box" versions, then I bought 5 "self watering" pots, and made 5 myself. Now, the plants that were merrily growing in May are free-floating and drowning!!! All of the containers have recevoir run-off holes, but they were designed to absorb the water UP as needed, NOT continually have the water soak through the top down. The systems can't handle it, and the soil is washing over the tops. The soil can't dry between these heavy rains.

NOW we know why there's a flood! I bought/made these containers!!! I should have built an ark instead ;0)

An ark ok - 2 - violets, dephs, columbine, roses, lillies of all kinds, EE, tomatoe, pepper, etc, etc, etc AND ONE MORNING GLORY!

Wow, Sherrie, I can't believe you would even allow one MG!

This is a good year for making and keeping notes. Years from now we'll look back and say "Do you remember that awful year it was 90% for a month and then it rained for two?"

Tomorrow's another day, Scarlett.

Just Noticed comments on my misspelling.. DAH... whatever the spelling...I hate them.

JW, don't worry!!! We've ALL done it- except me, of course ;0)

It has not been "normal" rain. It comes in torrential down pours, with inches and inches and days and days and days. What about normal rain? You know the gentle steady stuff...... The next day the sun comes out and everyone is happy happy happy.

My slugs and frogs are happy, happy, happy! So are the weeds... for those of us who have private wells and no municipal water options, it's good to have the surplus. I have more cattails than loosetrife this year, too!
I'm trying to look on the bright side!!! Glub, glub, glub... (drowning)

Well the bright side would be that the Fall foliage is likely to be nice, right? Isn't that how it works, more water equals nicer Fall color? Or maybe that's a myth, I dunno.

Still another gray, gloomy day with no sun and no rain...just a damp, cool, moldy feeling kinda day!

They always say the foliage is bad b/c of dry weather; this year, the color won't be good b/c of WET weather! Or beetles, caterpillars- what have you. The news only focuses on the bad, it seems. If there is great color, they probably won't say a word, leaf-ing us to judge for ourselves.

LOL Jax. Leafing us, really cute. Should be good vibrant color and lots of leaves up north. Down here we have been having some leaves turning all summer from lack of enough rain. One thing I heard on the news was the winter following a very rainy summer and fall is usually lighter on the snow totals on average. So maybe there will be a silver lining to all the rain up there this year.

I hope your right about the snow ngam! My husband has to have surgery and won't be able to help with the shoveling this year!! With any luck it will be a "warm" winter with the energy costs sky rocketing!!

Ok this is very weird, found some JBs(which I took care of by drowning in soapy water) yesterday. I thought they were gone for the year.
Hadn't seen any in 2 wks.

I haven't seen any for about 10 days to two wks either. There are always stragglers I suppose, but you got the little buggers. Good for you. :)

We are still having tons of the little devils...they are still after my morning glories, which are about 10% compared to last year, and my green beans.... John bought milky spore, we have already done the grubex...oh boy...all that work for nothing...

BUT THERE IS ALWAYS NEXT YEAR.

lIZA

I wonder what the wet, cool weather does to JBs? I've noticed lots more earthworms in the mulch, and they're HUGE, so they seem to love things the way they are. BTW, what is that big glowing thing in the sky today? ;0)
Guys, send me your snow. I love it. I have new snow shoes and I love to ski! One year, I spent a week at Killington in early March. It never stopped snowing there, so the bed of my pickup was full of snow when I left. When I arrived here in NE Mass, the ground was bare, but I had 2' of snow with me! I wish I had the time to have made a snowman w/ it.

We have actually been seeing the sun for three straight days now! That's enough to see that the tan I thought I had isn't a tan at all. It's rust!

LOL!!

I was at Old Sturbridge Village yesterday and took the tour of the kitchen garden circa 1830. The farmer uses onion greens tea for bugs and he says that it works on JB. I have some green onions soaking in the watering can right now! Old Sturbridge is really a nice, laid back kind of place to go. Although I did have a discussion with one of their young presenters about mordants and natural dyes and she was wrong! Otherwise everyone was quite knowledgeable. I did learn that oxen are trained steers. Obviously they never saw Babe, the Blue Ox.

I always wanted to sign on as a boat builder and restorer. It is not as easy to land even a volunteer job at museum organizations like Old Sturbridge as one might think. Maybe I knew to much to please them. What they want are answer memory aces and tour guide types not always good crafts people. There seems to always be one who really knows from experience and a lot of helpers. I think it helps to be a good looking co-ed too. Over all we really like Old Sturbridge and have been there several times.

With proper planning they permitted me to take the lines off of a duckboat I thought was just ....well duckey. They may have one of the best over all institutions of its type.

Onion greens or garlic greens work better for me as a preventive than as a control item. I think if you get an odor occupation well established the beetle of all types may just go elsewhere. Going elsewhere may save a plant but the beetle know what they have to do to reprocuce and they will go elsewhere and continue eating. I guess knowing this is beneficial for one's management. The also do not establish their own odors therefore following beetle go elsewhere too. If you own "elsewhere" is it really a positive move to spray with anything that will not do them in?

I wonder if onion green tea works for deer and other critters too...

Onion teas work for deer and other critters if you change the odor every few days. Lead from a boom stick always works. Tires over head always works. Live preditors sometimes work. Live traps sometimes work. Some of all of the above likely provides the best total answer.

You left out hot lead, Dwaine!

Dwaine, what's a boom stick?

I guess it's a gun which would make my post a mistake!

All right - what about mildew? My pumpkins just got mildew and the neighborhood kids are counting on pumpkins for Halloween! I cut off the most effected leaves and put them in the trash. Anyone tried hydrogen peroxide or chive tea?

Is it powdery mildew? I heard you can use a mixture of milk and water or some say using baking soda works well.

Neem Oil and two tablespoons of baking soda per gal of water is a very good fungicide. I know the label indicates no additives but I can assure you this combo is OK and very good.
Follow the no high heat applications by doing it early AM or late afternoon in the falling sun. Skip it if the temperature is above eighty degrees anytime during application desires.

Thank you for posting all this wonderful info about controlling the dreaded Japanese beetles everybody. I have had a lot of them this year - I'm a British expat and I don't remember ever seeing them in the UK. Having read all this, I'm going to go down to the nursery and see about getting some Milky Spore (sounds like a candy...)