Your plans for dealing with squash bugs and vine borers

[HiPoha]

I have pickleworms here that do the same damage. I can't help but use Sevin on the plants. Does a good job in preventing worm damage to my squash and cucumbers.

[joseph]

Once upon a time there was a squash breeding program at a land-grant university. The proprietors of the program decided that all squash eating bugs would be eliminated from the fields by application of poisons. The plant breeders continued this strategy for many decades, applying pesticides every few weeks during the growing season so that no bug would ever molest the squash plants. The plants grew for many generations without a care in the world for bugs. The genetic memory of how to deal with bugs got diluted and mostly lost amidst genes for pretty colors and uniform sized and shaped fruit. Bugs were never a problem for the squash because there was always plenty of poison to go around.

Then the plant breeders sent the squash seeds out into the world, and they fell into the hands of bumpkins who felt that it was not wise to apply poisons to their food. The bugs, and the beetles, and the worms found the plants -- which had lost their memory -- and cried out "Party Time!" The plants were essentially defenseless against the bugs because they had grown for time immemorial in an environment without bugs. Nevertheless, an occasional plant in an occasional garden managed to eek out a frugal existence and produce a fruit in spite of the bugs. A few shrewd bumpkins noticed the production of fruit against-all-odds, and gathered together the seeds from the survivors and replanted them. After a few generations of promiscuous-pollination and survival-of-the-fittest selection the genetics of the squash got realigned so that the plants survived the bugs more often than not, and even began to thrive in the presence of bugs. Then once a crop could be reliably harvested the shrewd bumpkins started doing farmer-directed selection for other desired traits.
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Once upon a time there was a squash breeding program at a land-grant university. The proprietors of the program decided that liberal amounts of fertilizer would be applied to the plants...
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Once upon a time there was a squash breeding program at a land-grant university. The proprietors of the program decided that liberal amounts of fungicides would be applied to the plants...

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I lost something like 3 Maxima squash plants out of 300 to squash bugs last summer. That's great odds as far as I'm concerned. Didn't lose any butternuts to bugs.

[greenthumbomaha]

An entire season was lost to these buggers at my old volunteer food bank garden. The MG group handled the situation as follows:

squash borers - make a little collar around the base with tinfoil, paint base with neem oil
squash bugs - no easy solution, nymphs overwinter underground and come up from the soil in huge quantities, do not plant in the same area for 3-4 years
plant after July to miss hatching eggs
cucumber beetles - ugh, agree with Durgan, buy squash from someone else
no problems with cucumbers, the beetle only wilted squash for me

Problems started coming out of no where about 3 years ago. I grew patty pan last year and had no diseases, but really miss peaking under the leaves for the big green zucchs for making bread.

- Lisa

[Durgan]

I have numerous cucumber beetles. I am of the opinion that they spread downy mildew, which I get every year. They are present on the cucumbers, squash, watermelon, and sometimes on potatoes. Some mornings the squash flowers have as many as 25 in each cup. I spray with a shot of Raid but certainty doesnt reduce there numbers to zero.

I get usually two flushes of cucumbers before pulling.

[clkeiper]

We plant early producing crops (first pick variety). We also plant in black plastic mulch them cover the crop with hoops and floating row cover until flowering time. My zucchinis are already in the ground here. We planted them last week. We will plant more for a later crop in a couple more weeks and again a third time for late summer crop. there is just no way to keep the same crop going for us that long. We grow for farmer markets and need to have a crop. The SVB doesn't seem to know there should be a cycle... it keeps coming back.

[Tracydr]

I've found diamectous earth sprinkled all around the base, inner stems and underside of leaves does a decent job with the bugs.
Haven't tried neem oil yet since it's always so hot. I'm always afraid of burning the leaves by spraying them with oil.

[Jaysan]

I ordered some mosquito netting to cover my plants. I may or may not pollinate by hand. I only have 6 containers to do so it shouldn't be too much of a chore.

[beeman]

I can sympathise with all your problems with in ground larvae emerging to feast on your plants, but I fail to understand why you don't invest in 'Beneficial nematodes'?
If you apply them to your ground correctly and at the right time they should eliminate the problem, even Japanese beetles.
I used to suffer with in ground larvae, codling moth mainly and my apples suffered. I applied beneficial nematodes and eliminated them, plus a bad case of wire worm.
Do a Google search and have a read.

[Jaysan]

I grow in containers.
Also when my squash plants wilted badly I opened up the entire main stem and killed every one of the little buggers.
I hope this year that will help but I do have a neighbor that had them and I don't know if he did that.
That's why the mosquito netting.

[Tracydr]

Beneficial nematodes are so cool! They can even kill fire ants, fleas, chiggers and ticks!

[beeman]

Originally Posted by Tracydr

Beneficial nematodes are so cool! They can even kill fire ants, fleas, chiggers and ticks!

Yeah! So the question has to be. Why aren't more folks taking advantage? It would help the rest of us with the infestations that keep happening.

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by beeman

Yeah! So the question has to be. Why aren't more folks taking advantage? It would help the rest of us with the infestations that keep happening.

As a rule, predatory nematodes (mostly free living) are larger than the pest nematodes, smaller than earthworms, and because of this they also are SEVERELY harmed by plowing and/or tilling. They simply can't get around fast enough to catch anything and die in tilled ground. That gives the pests they prey on a free chance to have population explosions and harm our crops. Applying things like Sevin only makes it worse.

Here is a good scientific paper on nematodes and it explains why soil structure is so important.

Ecology of Plant and Free-Living Nematodes in Natural and Agricultural Soil

Soil nematodes (typically 40 μm to 1.0 mm in length) are classified either as microfauna or mesofauna; their small size makes them unable to reshape soil and, therefore, they are forced to use existing pore spaces, water cavities, or channels for locomotion within soil.

So you see? Till the soil and break up that existing soil structure and you destroy the beneficial nematodes' ability to survive.

[Jaysan]

I did get some mosquito netting from Amazon and so far all is good. Not even any of those cucumber bugs that look like stinkbugs. Have been hand pollinating and have squash growing. I just have 6 plants so not hard to keep up with.

[shelleybean]

Another Virginia gardener, chiming in. This week I've noticed that the SVB moth, the squash bugs and the cucumber beetles have all arrived, along with the Japanese beetles. I usually have to pull all my squash around the Fourth of July because of the SVB. Right now I have about an equal number of zucchini and summer squash out in the garden and there are three varieties of zucchini. I notice that all the bugs seem to prefer attacking the zucchini, and especially the Fordhook zucchini. They're leaving the crooknecks and the yellow scallop alone, which is good for me because those are the ones I prefer to eat. I had planned to only grow the yellow next year but I now think I'll put a "sacrifice" zucchini right in the middle of the bed.

Other than that, I am going to try injecting Bt directly into the stems this time. So far I cannot see any damage. Not even sure the little buggers have hatched out yet, so hopefully I can get a good jump on them.

So far squash bugs are not a big issue (unlike Japanese beetles). I have a product from Safer that is a combo of insecticidal soap and pyrethrum that says it works on stink bugs and harlequin bugs. Hoping that will do the trick.

The big problem with cucumber beetles is they want the flowers and if you spray into the flowers, then you are killing off the bees, as well. I have a sticky trap out with a cucumber beetle lure but so far I've caught a bunch of flies!

[b54red]

The easiest way to control the SVB is once the plant is in the ground keep it mulched heavily and keep a good dusting of Sevin on the main stem. After every heavy rain or heavy watering reapply the Sevin Dust to the stem. Since I started doing this three years ago I haven't lost any plants to SVBs until we tire of eating squash and I quit dusting them.

I also find the dust is fairly good at keeping out pickle worms in cucumbers and the cucumber beetle. Make sure to apply it very late in the evening so you don't bother the bees. By the way I have more bees this year than I have seen in the last ten years so this method must not be harming them like sprays and stronger pesticides. I found BT to be totally useless against both the SVB and pickle worms. I still use it but it seems that some worms just don't get enough of it in them to bother them or they are not affected by it. I just don't know. I have had to resort to the Sevin dust on several tomato and pepper plants that despite BT were getting thoroughly consumed by worms.

Bill