Gel balls forming on the outside of squash?

elliephant 7/17/2012, 9:23 am

See the worm on the bottom?
Gel balls forming on the outside of squash? Img_3211

Anyone have experience with this? It's on my tromboncino/rampicante squash.

**camprn** 7/17/2012, 10:19 am

Ewww... that is a borer (LOL, nothing like stating the obvious silly me

) not sure what insect though... More than likely if the beast isn't in the vine, you will get more fruit coming later. Check the vine for symptoms of borer activity. I would remove the infested vegetables, dig out the worms and then compost the squash... Good luck!

Pollinator 7/17/2012, 10:33 am

elliephant wrote:
Anyone have experience with this? It's on my tromboncino/rampicante squash.

Pickleworm. It's a fall pest here in South Carolina, but it seems to be getting started early! Once inside there's nothing you can do.

Some spray to kill the adult moths as they come to lay eggs. I won't do that, but I'm putting out yellow sticky pads to trap them. Here's more: http://entnemdept.ufl.edu/creatures/veg/pickleworm.htm

elliephant 7/17/2012, 10:44 am

How very interesting! The very first sentence in the link was

Pickleworm is a tropical insect which routinely survives the winter only in south Florida and perhaps south Texas

We didn't get a freeze this year, so I guess it survived!

elliephant 7/17/2012, 11:11 am

Just noticed a lemon cucumber I'd left out on the counter yesterday...frass coming out of it! Yup, there was another one in there. I was in the process of pulling squash and cukes from the garden to make room for fall crops anyway. Just hope they don't get the watermelon. I was going to plant new watermelon for fall, but maybe now I'll just do cantaloupe.

**walshevak** 7/17/2012, 7:21 pm

Don't compost the squash until you open it up and see if there is anything to salvage. Worm damage does not always mean unedible. Sometimes you can cut out the affected part.

Kay

Triciasgarden 7/17/2012, 11:12 pm

I agree "Ewww".

CapeCoddess 7/18/2012, 3:20 pm

Frass??? Is that the jelly balls?

From Wiki: Frass is the fine powdery material phytophagous (plant-eating) insects pass as waste after digesting plant parts.[1] It causes plants to excrete chitinase due to high chitin levels, it is a natural bloom stimulant, and has high nutrient levels. Frass is known to have abundant amoeba, beneficial bacteria, and fungi content. Frass is a microbial inoculant, also known as a soil inoculant, that promotes plant health using beneficial microbes. It is a large nutrient contributor to the rainforest, and it can often be seen in leaf mines.

So should we put it back into the garden???

oiy...

CC

**llama momma** 7/18/2012, 3:43 pm

CapeCoddess wrote:Frass??? Is that the jelly balls?

So should we put it back into the garden???

oiy...

CC

I guess since compost worm turds are good for the garden then so is frass, how about you try it first! jocolor

CapeCoddess 7/18/2012, 4:08 pm

Eww...ick...blech...

I don't have any.....yet. My time is a'comin some year tho...

CC

Pollinator 7/18/2012, 9:09 pm

walshevak wrote:Don't compost the squash until you open it up and see if there is anything to salvage. Worm damage does not always mean unedible. Sometimes you can cut out the affected part.

Kay

Right! We just had an acorn squash with a hole in it. I found damage and a pickleworm inside, but was able to salvage about 2/3rds of it.

Patty from Yorktown 7/19/2012, 7:59 am

Good Morning,
You are growing my favorite squash. Hopefully there will not be too many worms. The gel balls are the plants response to damage. My plant does that when I cut it in the kitchen. Just in case this is the first time you have grown that squash, it will get huge. Mine will eat half of a swing set before the summers end. I would just feed it some compost and let it go. If you leave the squashes on the vine longer they will turn from a summer squash into a winter squash. It is pretty neat. Do not forget to save some seeds for next year. Happy gardening.
Patty from Yorktown

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