What's eating in your garden today?

acara wrote:

Ha-v-v wrote:That gator can run faster than me and you put together on dry land

and in a straight line ....



Very aware of all that ... and did it anyway.



Never claimed to be the sharpest crayon in the box

Are you related to us? LOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL

givvmistamps wrote:Something took a strip out of my baby zucchini sometime in the last 24 hours! I'm just wondering, what critter bites like that?!

M,



Are you sure thats not a "split" maybe? I've never seen a critter eat in a line/circle like that.



Wierd..... Let us know if you figure it out.

Wow givvmistamps it looks like you have an artistic OCD caterpillar on your hands. If you find a caterpillar with a beret or a thin pencil mustache I would list him as suspect #1.

H_TX_2, that is sooo funny! No coffee on keyboard at this time of the day.....wine.

My guess is BEAVER....
They tend to nibble around the plant like that

I posted a few pics a few days ago. I went out and looked for the colorado potato beetle. It was full sun and I saw lots of different things, but nothing looked like the colorado potato beetle, unless they were teeny. I did see what I think were aphids but from what I remember they suck the nutrients from the plant. I saw teeny little beige crawling things, some were darker than others, little black hard things (maybe eggs) on the underside of plants. I tried taking pictures but the sun was so bright I couldn't tell where my view finder was focused.

The damage to leaves is now on by bean plants, and some leaves are totally gone. The beans are two beds away from the potatoes. Where are those black and red larger bugs that are usually here every year. They seem to eat the bad guys! As you can see I don't know the insect population very well, except the most obvious ones.

Triciasgarden wrote:I posted a few pics a few days ago. I went out and looked for the colorado potato beetle. It was full sun and I saw lots of different things, but nothing looked like the colorado potato beetle, unless they were teeny. I did see what I think were aphids but from what I remember they suck the nutrients from the plant. I saw teeny little beige crawling things, some were darker than others, little black hard things (maybe eggs) on the underside of plants. I tried taking pictures but the sun was so bright I couldn't tell where my view finder was focused.

The damage to leaves is now on by bean plants, and some leaves are totally gone. The beans are two beds away from the potatoes. Where are those black and red larger bugs that are usually here every year. They seem to eat the bad guys! As you can see I don't know the insect population very well, except the most obvious ones.

To my eye that looks like slug feasting. Are the baby slugs hatching? They look like nothing but bits of gray water/soil but don't smear. They are starting to hatch here and I am starting to see some damage. I just scattered some Sluggo for them.

My daughter found this guy just hanging around:




Then put him in a cup to take pictures and got this:



He has been returned to wildflower garden to continue doing his job eating the bad guys.

he looks like a character from Star wars......

Thank you Turan. As I pulled weeds I noticed snails. Yuk. I will have to check for slugs, yuk again! Snails are easier to pick up and dispose of but slugs!

So it doesn't look like anything was eating in my garden today... at least, it wasn't eating anything I planted. Instead I found a big hole next to my strawberry plant with a bunch of corn kernels in it!! I guess someone nearby has a squirrel feeder and a squirrel thought my strawberries were hungry...

This helps confirm what it was that ate my basil, pepper plant, radish tops... ugh. Guess that bird netting is staying on the beds and I'll have to figure out a good way to protect everything else.

Stupid squirrel!

pickle worms time to brake out the BT

slugs and tortoise beetles

Birds pulled up or snapped off several of my new field pea sprouts. Replanted this morning and cover in tulle.

Kay

Something keeps eating my strawberries before they're ready to pick. Think it's ants!

could you guys tell me what BT you use, like commercial names.

Thuracide

H_TX_2 wrote:Wow givvmistamps it looks like you have an artistic OCD caterpillar on your hands. If you find a caterpillar with a beret or a thin pencil mustache I would list him as suspect #1.

I'm certain that wasn't a split, it looked, on closer inspection, to have been chewed. It split up the back the next day, and the edges were entirely different.

Squirrel!

I happened to notice him on the fence in front of my dining room window, munching on a longish strand of something. Upon closer inspection, I discovered that it was devouring ROSE BUDS AND STEMS! And my feline anti-squirrel security device was asleep on the job.

Slugs, didn't think they'd find the brand new beds, but they were there a week after installation.

Ericam if you think it is ants eating your strawberries, you need to get rid of them but go with something that will not damage your strawberries. Go to: https://squarefoot.forumotion.com/t10795-any-new-tricks-to-get-rid-of-ants for great ideas. I need to get rid of the ants in my beds also.

Also some people use row covers to prevent birds and other critters from getting to their strawberries. Some use Tulle that I think I read they got for $1 a yd. from JoAnns Fabrics. Anchor it with bricks.

Cabbage worms?

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What should I do?
Sorry for the bad quality picture, I couldn't get it to focus very well.

Yep. Cabbage worm. Good luck getting them all. Nonna

Not absolutely sure what's eating my bell pepper leaves, but I have two problems that I believe are unrelated. One is holes in the leaves all over the plant (though it started on the lower leaves first) similar to the holes I find in the Swiss chard, but I can't find a caterpillar or worm like I found on the chard. The other is where entire leaves (except the stem) at the very top of the plant are being eaten. My husband thinks the second problem is deer, so I'm going to put my son's stinky socks out to see if that helps keep them away. Those socks chase those of us who love him away, so they gotta work on deer!

If you have any ideas on what might be eating little holes in the leaves, I'm all ears! I've tried spraying Organicide on it, but it didn't seem to help for very long...but the Organicide is from last year, so maybe it's lost effectiveness? At least I was able to harvest the first peppers off the plant today. I just hope there are enough leaves left by the time I chase off the critters so my next batch manages to grow as big and lovely!

As to the pin holes on the pepper, I'm stumped--could it be small slugs? But, whole chunks of leaves and entire leaves missing very well could be deer. About the only thing you can do is put a protective barrier around your beds. Cheapest is that heavy plastic deer fencing strung on posts. Solar hot wire is said to work. Cattle panels and fence posts. I've seen lots of ideas on this forum. Hungry deer will eat just about anything! We'd been told they wouldn't eat figs because of the milky sap the tree produces. A doe ate all but 3 leaves on our new fig last year. After the deer- and elk-proof fence was built, we moved the little fig into the protected garden...it survived.