As I readied my fork to eat a homegrown salad with edible flowers, a few aphids paraded into sight. Less worried about eating them than I was about my gardener-colleagues knowing I had an aphid infestation, I discreetly picked off aphids as I ate. And I made a mental note: aphids like nasturtiums. Because my flower garden is not a display garden and I’m not a commercial market … [Read more...] about Pest guide: 10 pests to worry about
Japanese beetles
Japanese beetles march — and munch — on
That crunching sound you hear is Japanese beetles making a meal of my roses. It’s hard to do an accurate count on beetles per square foot of garden, but it seems like there are an awful lot of them this summer. Whatever the numbers, their proliferation reflects last summer’s weather conditions when beetles were laying the eggs that hatched this year. There must have been ideal … [Read more...] about Japanese beetles march — and munch — on
Japanese beetle news
Stop the press — there’s encouraging news about Japanese beetles! You may know that from time to time, I go off on a rant about Japanese beetles and the amount of damage they do to roses. Nothing legally available will stop their progress through satiny, scented rose petals, and they also feed on nearly 300 other plant species. The USDA Agricultural Research Service has been … [Read more...] about Japanese beetle news
How to prevent (ok, reduce) next year’s Japanese beetles
When Japanese beetles discover your garden, it can be frustrating. I stopped counting after dunking more than 300 into soapy water. The beetles enjoy eating the leaves of more than 200 different plants and trees, and in our garden they feast on one particular rose bush and a corkscrew hazel. There seems so little one can do other than stand guard to spy the beetles and then … [Read more...] about How to prevent (ok, reduce) next year’s Japanese beetles
