THE JAPANESE HAVE INVADED THE US!!!!

[so lucky]

Bee, You can freeze the JBs that you catch in the trap, and feed them to the chickens in the winter. Just empty the trap daily into a gallon size zip-lock bag.
They are after the pole beans and the roses at my house.
My daily routine is morning and evening, go through the garden with a container (cottage cheese tub) with about an inch of water. Put the container under the leaves and knock the bugs off into the water quickly, so they don't fly away when they realize you are there.
Then after you do this around the garden, set the container in the chicken yard.

 

[Beekissed]

I've had ducks here but, without a water feature, they just don't fit into the homestead life here. Especially in the winter months.

Well, emptied the trapped JBs in the chicken trough and immediately some flew away. Since there were about a hundred or two, I had a hard time killing them before too many escaped. The chickens were not familiar with that kind of offering from me, so they stood too far back to prevent the mass exodus. So, I put the trap up next to the coop and before I could turn around there were several in the bag.

I walked the garden this evening and saw not a single JB on any one plant so, for now, some have been destroyed. Tomorrow another battle, I'm sure, but I'm bringing out the citronella essential oil/soapy water spray to spray down the cukes, as they were doing a lot of mating there, so I'm assuming a lot of pheromones were released there to attract others to the same love shack.

We'll see how this all goes down. I'm hoping my chickens will take care of any life cycles going on at the egg to larvae stage before they dig into the soils. We've haven't seen JBs here for nigh on 40 yrs so I'm thinking these are from elsewhere and hadn't hatched in this soil.

 

[Beekissed]

Bee, You can freeze the JBs that you catch in the trap, and feed them to the chickens in the winter. Just empty the trap daily into a gallon size zip-lock bag.
They are after the pole beans and the roses at my house.
My daily routine is morning and evening, go through the garden with a container (cottage cheese tub) with about an inch of water. Put the container under the leaves and knock the bugs off into the water quickly, so they don't fly away when they realize you are there.
Then after you do this around the garden, set the container in the chicken yard.

Oh, so lucky, where were you earlier this evening when I needed that excellent idea??? They make my very skin crawl like crazy, so I'll try the freezing idea but...but....but those demon bugs will be in my freezer!!!!

Excellent idea...why didn't I think of that?

 

[journey11]

This is the most JBs I've seen in a long time. They are all over everything! It would take all day to pick them off. Walked down the back 40 and saw them all over the wild grapevines. Not much I can do about those.

I always give my chickens any grubs I come across. I don't think mine would know what to do with the beetles either. The big green June bugs are coming out now too!

 

[Carol Dee]

Not to down play your chemical attack, @majorcatfish, but most don't do a lot against beetles unless you manage to get them with their wings open.

My first line of offense against these voracious beast has always been hand-picking. That and several years of Milky Spore applications further and further from population central.

Milky Spore, milky spore, milky spore *reminder to self* get the milky spore !

 

[so lucky]

So are the fat white grubs, about an inch long by 1/4 inch wide, the grubs from JBs or from the bigger black beetles that get entangled in your hair at night and are attracted to light?
And does milky spore work on all kinds of grubs?

 

[Lavender2]

Great tips for dealing with the JBs!
Spraying their scent away with the soapy water on the target plants helps tremendously, I have found.

 

[Beekissed]

Walked the garden this morning and found only one JB, on the cukes. Those caught in the trap yesterday evening up by the coop are the only ones there, no additional bugs were caught.

I'm thinking about putting the trap away, sealing the scent thingies into a zip loc, until they are needed once again. From what I've read about the life cycles of these beetles, they are most active from the end of June and through July. If they get heavy in the garden again and I notice more breeding activity, I'll whip out that trap again.

Today I'll spray those cuke leaves with my citronella solution...that stuff is so strong smelling that it should cover any pheromone scent to be found there. I'm using citronella to keep the squirrels from stripping my apple trees right now and it seems to be working...haven't seen a squirrel around the trees since.

 

[Beekissed]

Haven't done the citronella spray yet but trimmed up my overgrown mint patch and hung mint on the cuke trellis. That strong scent may take care of all the sexy smells there, who knows?

 

[majorcatfish]

Not to down play your chemical attack, @majorcatfish, but most don't do a lot against beetles unless you manage to get them with their wings open.

My first line of offense against these voracious beast has always been hand-picking. That and several years of Milky Spore applications further and further from population central.

have been weening myself off using insecticides, but there are times that a good shot of triazicide works wonders just have to use your best judgement. spray jb it's dead in 5 minutes ,with that said if there are blooms anywhere close don't use it....