It is currently Tue Mar 19, 2024 12:56 am

All times are UTC - 6 hours




Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 12 posts ] 
Author Message
PostPosted: Tue Oct 20, 2009 12:38 pm 
Offline

Joined: Tue Oct 20, 2009 12:22 pm
Posts: 129
Location: Frisco, Tejas
About a month or so ago I noticed some sort of 'Ladybug lookin thing' all over my Alyssum in my flowerbeds. Doing a little online detective work, I am pretty certain I have ID'd it as a Bagrada bug. Pretty prolific little SOB's too.

From what I've read, it sounds like this is an import and there have been a lot of reports of it in California. I'm in North Texas and know a lot of members are as well. Has anyone run into this pest? It did a nice job of defoliating a large number of plants and I do Alyssum every year so I am looking for a control for next Spring.

My garden: Soil: Filled the beds with Living Earth's mix when I built the beds two years ago, farmland before that mostly (Hunter's Creek, Frisco). I use a variety of organic ferts and don't treat for insects beyond the occasional BT spray in my veggie garden. I have a decent number of mantids around, tons of spiders, very active soil with tons of earthworms... Fair amount of compost (make my own)...

Thoughts/suggestions welcome. I'm 90% sure this is the critter: Image


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Oct 23, 2009 10:51 pm 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sat Jul 25, 2009 12:42 am
Posts: 142
Location: Denton, Texas
I would try doing what the farmer from Africa did, by hand picking them into a jar, then crushing them, then sprinkling the crushed remains back onto the plants. And I also bet that orange oil would eat these guys' lunch. Are these beetles here in Texas? Keep us informed incase I am attacked after I plant my garden... :(


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Sun Oct 25, 2009 7:18 pm 
Offline

Joined: Tue Oct 20, 2009 12:22 pm
Posts: 129
Location: Frisco, Tejas
Hmmmm.... well, I saw a few hundred fullgrown ones when I pulled the spent alyssum so handpicking, while good, isn't likely to fix this. I'm hoping they can't overwinter here and assuming they came in with some plants from California where there have been a lot of reports of infestation.

I'm a major xenophobe when it comes to pests - the absence of a natural predator is typically a bad bad thing so foreign pests scare me.

Anyone else caught sight of one of these?

I don't use sprays much on the theory that even the non-toxic ones are also non selective. I use a little BT when the hornworms come but that's and a hard blast from the hose is all I do. After a couple years I've found that for the most part, I have a huge number of spiders, ladybugs, mantids and lacewings so the inevitable aphid and other similarly unpleasant invasions are quelled.

Found a very large mantis joyfully beheading a tomato hornworm that was pillaging my tomato countryside this summer and the evil glee I felt actually made me wonder if I'm 'alright' :-)

Wonder if the ladybugs and mantids will figure out that the eggy and nymphs are a nice snack if they make it to Spring?


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Mon Oct 26, 2009 2:27 am 
Offline
User avatar

Joined: Sat Jul 25, 2009 12:42 am
Posts: 142
Location: Denton, Texas
Apparently if you pick "some" of them, then crush them and spread the crushed beatles around your plants it repells them. Maybe by crushing thier bodies it releases a chemical and signals danger... I don't know, it could be bull, but this is what the people from the beatle's natural habitat actually do. Good luck


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Wed Oct 28, 2009 5:47 pm 
Offline

Joined: Tue Oct 20, 2009 12:22 pm
Posts: 129
Location: Frisco, Tejas
Oh OK, I missed the 'see what happened to yer little buddies' part.

They are a form of stink bug so that makes sense, will go on a bagradacidal killing spree and see what happens.


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Sun Jul 22, 2012 9:35 pm 
Offline

Joined: Sun Jul 22, 2012 9:27 pm
Posts: 1
My alyssum was almost totally wiped out this summer by these insects!
http://cisr.ucr.edu/bagrada_bug.html
I have sprayed now 6/20/2012 with Bonide All Seasons horticultural oil and I do not see them, but as well, I don't see piles of insect bodies on the concrete where they were hanging over. I'll need to get a magnifying glass and check down in the dirt.
I have also trimmed the scraggly alyssum back 1/2, watered well, and will use some Miracle Grow all plants fertilizer (since I'm not eating these plants) and see if I can get them back to health and beauty. I miss the aromatic alyssum!
The beetles seemed to have concentrated only on these plants in my front yard and I've not found them on my other plants or edibles. :evil:


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Sun Jul 22, 2012 11:01 pm 
Offline
Moderator
Moderator
User avatar

Joined: Wed Jul 02, 2003 8:09 pm
Posts: 1917
Location: Fort Worth,TEXAS
I would try a couple of things - I spoke to Howard about a flea beetle problem last week, and said I was going to try a neem drench. He has had issues with the shelf-life of liquid neem, and said it gets tied up in the surface biological activity pretty quickly. He suggested I would be better off using some Garrett juice and a little biowash along with a couple of ounces of orange oil in the gallon of water. This is as a drench to kill the generations in the soil (but you can pour it over the plants as you drench the soil).

Here is an image from Gevork Arakelian, Senior Biologist, Los Angeles County Agricultural Commissioner/Weights & Measures Department:

Attachment:
bagrada_bug_02[1].jpg
bagrada_bug_02[1].jpg [ 138.95 KiB | Viewed 33367 times ]


And here is a flyer.

I'd still think about trying neem on the foliage, it will kill things that eat foliage, but it isn't good for all plants. Test a small section of alyssum first - it can kill some plants, especially in this warm weather. (For example, don't put it on zucchini, and peppers aren't real happy about it.)

Catching by hand, while slow, is still an option you should use when you're out there. I have gardening gloves that have that rubberized skin over the cloth, and those are good for catching and squashing without getting the bug juice on your skin. You never know what will happen if you squash a bug with your bare hands (though I do it all of the time on bugs I'm familiar with that I know won't hurt me.)

_________________
Northwesterner


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Sat Jul 28, 2012 4:44 pm 
Offline

Joined: Wed Sep 08, 2010 6:18 pm
Posts: 28
Location: Corpus Christi,TEXAS
I know Howard does not really care for the liquid neem but he has mentioned a powdered form I think that he said he liked, does anyone know what the name of it is?


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Sat Jul 28, 2012 6:38 pm 
Offline
Moderator
Moderator
User avatar

Joined: Wed Jul 02, 2003 8:09 pm
Posts: 1917
Location: Fort Worth,TEXAS
I made a note last week. He called it Azasol.

_________________
Northwesterner


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Mon Jul 30, 2012 5:23 pm 
Offline

Joined: Wed Sep 08, 2010 6:18 pm
Posts: 28
Location: Corpus Christi,TEXAS
Thanks Nrthwesterner


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Sep 11, 2015 8:08 pm 
Offline

Joined: Fri Sep 11, 2015 8:04 pm
Posts: 1
I live in San Diego. I have an organic backyard garden with kale, collard greens, broccoli, cauliflower, bell peppers, tomatoes, zucchini, spinach, eggplants, beets, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, onions, leeks, and a large variety of herbs.

I started noticing that by the time my cauliflower heads should have been forming nicely, i saw what appeard to be multiple heads that were very clearly stunted.

Not yet putting the pieces together, a few weeks earlier, some of my broccoli plants, while prodcuing, seemed to have severly slowed down.

Meanwhile, my very prolific ragged jack (red winter) kale plants started developing white, scorched edges, the leaves wilted, and major holes began to develop. Less so with the collards, but they had many large holes in the leaves. So, I trimmed the affected leaves back, cleared whatever debris that may have been laying on the topsoil, cleared any weeds, and started paying attention more closely.

At this time is when i saw my first bragada bug. They seemed to have infested my furthest patch of cauliflower...and encroached a bit more each day, until I found total infestation in all my cole crops. In fact, one morning i discovered that they had consumed two entire cauliflower plants. It was as if someone came back there and pulled the plants from the ground in the middle of the night. That was my call to action.

I have a very prolific garden and finally got the point where 80 percent of the veggies I ate came from my back yard, so, naturally I didn't want to lose my crops.

I started reading online to see what others were doing but honestly I didn't feel encouraged with the methods suggested.

At first I tried scattering a few sluggo plus pellets to see if that would help. It did not. Then I tried spraying organocide (fish oil, sesame oil, and lethicin). That didn't help (although it drove the cats crazy for a few days...they just knew some food was laying around in that garden somewhere). In fact, it seemed to exacerbate the problem.

I did read about diatomaceous earth and soap treatment, both of which i had on hand. I caught a few of the bugs and threw them in a jar that was dusted with diatomaceous earth. I could tell that after an hour or so that it seemed to slow them down. The problem with DE, however is that it sinks into the soil upon watering.

I tested the soapy water spray as well, and that, much to my surprise, seemed to work almost instantly.

So, I filled up my spray container with soapy water and began spraying all the leaves. After that, i sprinkled a light coating of diatomaceous earth directly on the leaves and under the plants.

The next day, I saw not a single bragada bug...not one. I was elated. As a precautionary measure, I left the DE on the leaves for 48 hours, then rinsed them off. I doused each bed with about two gallons of soapy water just in case any were hiding out in the soil and again sprinkled the beds lightly with DE.

I haven't seen a single bragada at all and I'm very pleased. What I thought was going to be total decimation by bragada, instead turned into a total organic eradication - by soap - within 24 hours.

I thought I'd share my results.

Happy gardening!


Top
 Profile  
 
PostPosted: Fri Sep 11, 2015 10:47 pm 
Offline
Moderator
Moderator
User avatar

Joined: Wed Jul 02, 2003 8:09 pm
Posts: 1917
Location: Fort Worth,TEXAS
Thank you very much!

_________________
Northwesterner


Top
 Profile  
 
Display posts from previous:  Sort by  
Post new topic Reply to topic  [ 12 posts ] 

All times are UTC - 6 hours


Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 1 guest


You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot post attachments in this forum

Search for:
Jump to:  
Powered by eWeblife