Caterpillar Wars

 

It seems that just when you think you have caught up with your garden work, some other task becomes of utmost importance. With the garden 98% planted and growing along, it seems to be entering a period of time when pests become a big problem. 

For the past two or three years I've been having a problem with squash vine borers. This pest is particularly frustrating, I don't seem to know there is ever a problem until a plant is on it's way to die. Every book I've read that talks about it says how you can see the adult flying around during the day and how conspicuous it is. Maybe the squash vine borer moths in my area take ninja classes with the chipmunks, because I never see them in action.

There is another menace for me this year, and that is cutworm. These guys really are stealthy... I've only ever seen them when I used to go out to mass slaughter slugs at night with a flashlight. As a side note: while I have plenty of pest to complain about, for some reason slugs are not one of them this year.

 

Here you can see some sunflower transplants that have essentially been decapitated. I planted a whole seed tray of sunflowers, so thankfully I should get at least, oh I don't know, one or two plants that survive unto maturity! Between chipmunks digging up the ONE little seed that MIGHT be left at the base of the plant, thereby killing the entire plant, I also have some insect menace that has decided to kick me in the ribs over the sunflowers.

 

My strong suspicion is cutworm. Usually cutworm is described as having lumberjacked the whole plant at the base, but in my flashlight madness over slugs, I've seen them climb several inches up the stem of a plant. Either cutworm or ants... I've been seeing ants all over the sunflowers, but I think they are just farming their own insects. Cutworm- guilty!

 

To protect my plants I made aluminum foil collars for the stems. Ever have a moment where you come up with an idea that makes you feel like a genius? Well, this whole aluminum foil collar thing was one of those moments. I was weeding (and probably weeping) over my poor sunflowers, when I found a piece of aluminum foil on the ground that I had used previously as a tray for some other seedlings. I've heard of doing paper collars, so I thought the aluminum foil would be even better. It is so easy to shape around the stem of a plant and, in my imagination at least, I would think that a metal surface was more disturbing to crawl up for a caterpillar than paper.

 

I was boasting about my genius idea to my boyfriend, and then he suggested that maybe I wasn't the first person to think about it... sure enough, when googled 'aluminum foil collars', there were all sorts of hits and in application to deter cutworms. Well, at least I'm on the right track.

 

I've read that bows and arrows were likely developed independently around the globe by different groups of peoples. So like the aluminum foil collar for cutworms, when an idea is ripe enough for the human mind- it will be invented.

 

Also I have some good-for-nothing eating my healthy kale.

 

Enter Rambo the gardener. Enough is enough. I did some research this spring and kept hearing about this stuff called BTK or BT- Bacillus thuringiensis. It's a bacteria that naturally occurs in the soil. When it is consumed by a caterpillar, the extreme alkaline environment of their gut causes the bacteria to release an endotoxin which poisons the caterpillars digestive system. The stuff ends up eating holes in the lining of the gut, thereby allowing the bacteria and the contents of said gut to enter the body of the caterpillar- leading to deadly infections.

 

Oh oh, I know this sounds scary right?... only for a caterpillar though. The bacteria only works in extreme alkaline environments like a caterpillar gut. Humans and just about every other animal, have an acidic stomach environment that would kill the bacteria instantly. Did I mention you can BUY this bacteria and spray it on your plants? Yes, yes you can... and I did.

 

 

So between the aluminum foil collars for the cutworms and the BT spray for my squash plants... I really hope things go better this year. I'm especially bitter, if you can't tell, about the squash vine borer. So bon appetit to my little caterpillar fiends. Hee hee hee.

 

If all else fails with the sunflower transplants, I have some rogue sunflowers that are easily quadruple the size and are in no way going to be bothered by caterpillar or chipmunk.

I'm not targeting ALL caterpillars, though there might be some collateral damage. Here is a swallow tail caterpillar I found on one of the dill plants. I'm not particularly fond of caterpillars to begin with, but this guy is just so beautiful that I let him live. I'll be curious if I can keep track of it as it grows... and with dill forest in my garden, maybe I'll find more.