I was looking at my bug zapper in the garage and it dawned on me, the worm making monsters minus butterflies come out at night! I had a round of worms on my Tomatoes(they ignored my peppers) a few weeks back, had to seven them as a last resort. I put the black light bug zapper about 50 feet away, now lots of moths, and several other species are getting zapped. Meanwhile the toads(they camp under the light) are gettin real fat. I had an issue with those little nats that produce root eating maggots on my patio, I hung a bug strip under the light, the nats go up to the light and get stuck. I still have some nats, but nowhere near the previous numbers. As for the black light zapper, no new worms so far; I'm keeping my hopes up.
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pests Pest Prevention
- Thread starter Prehensile
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Would you be able to deal with it with praying mantises? I find them to be really cool and fascinating and plan on getting some to keep in my garden to help prevent pests.
Might have to look into that, I wonder how good they are at staying put. Trying to keep insecticides to a minimum as I found my plants are being pollinated by a few blue striped native bees which are pretty cool to look at than your average bee.
I've watched the mantis's I dont think they are nocternal and the tend to sit and wait for prey they like to hang out by flowering plants.
Ok after 4 weeks of black light bug zapper things look very good, the only trouble so far was a few days after I forgot to plug it in one weekend(seven had tah be used on the tomatoes). loads of moths have been cooked no way to count em, the toads camp out next to the zapper anything left behind the ants drag off.
Thanks for the updated info very interesting. I mainly had issues with tomatoes and spinach which aren't in anymore and they seem to leave my peppers alone as well? Either way I'll give it a go next summer and see if it helps in my case. Now if only it attracted possums
cars take care of them round here lots of food at the neighbors they leave my stuff alone...
Thats something that bothered the sh@# out of me, I thought about it for quite some time, Most of the predators hunt during the day and we have so many damn moths not a tomato/cucumber/cantaloupe etc stands a chance during our rainy season unless you use some serious poison, and I don't like using poison.
Have you thought about using BT? It's a wettable powder with bacteria as the main ingredient. Gets into the guts of the bugs that chew on the leaves and makes them fatally ill. Totally harmless to beneficial insects. A friend of mine had a lot of cabbage loopers in her kale and knocked them down with it. I don't see why it wouldn't work for tomato hornworms too. BT is short for Bacillus Thuringiensis, and if I remember correctly, a brand name is dipel.
http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/insect/05556.html
http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/insect/05556.html
HwyBill
Banned
Mantids also do a pretty good job of staying put. I bought three egg cases 3 years ago and I still have a very active and large population on them around. It was very rare for me to see them before that first year. They are cannibalistic and territorial so you will never have more than your ecosystem can support. They love big pepper plants by the way, I don't think I had a single day last year that I didn't see at least a dozen of them while out harvesting.
worm tea
now that sounds like a great Idea!
I found a few Lace Wings in the light since their larvae kill aphids, white fly nymphs and just about every other pest known to peppers, I have suspended using the bug zapper