Invasion at The Well Sprung Garden

Do you see these ugly little monsters? These are adolescent Colorado Potato Beetles, munching on one of the tomato plants. Yup, Potato Beetles also go after tomatoes (perhaps it's the whole potAto, potAHto, tomAto, tomAHto thing), and eggplants. Jane found the skeletal remains of two tomato plants yesterday, did some research, and found our culprits. Her immediate steps to fix this were to pull the two dead plants, snipped off all the leaves that had bugs and eggs on all the other tomato plants in the garden, collected everything in a sealed coffee can, took them out of the garden, and burned them.



These are what the eggs look like: the orange blotch, which is located on the underside of the leaf, which makes them hard to spot.

Now, we can't be certain that we've eliminated all of the Colorado Potato Beetles, larvae, pupae, and eggs, so according to Rodale's Garden Problem Solver, we can use either cornmeal, or wheat bran meal which is sprinkled on the plants. The beetles eat the meal, it expands inside them, and they explode--not unlike the scene in Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life." Other organic means of eliminating these pests include Diatomaceous Earth to destroy the larvae. D.E. consists of fossilized remains of diatoms, a type of hard-shelled algae. The fine powder absorbs lipids from the waxy outer layer of insects' exoskeletons, causing them to dehydrate. Arthropods, such as slugs or larvae, die as a result of the water pressure deficiency. There are other means of eliminating these pests, but most aren't organic, and some can be cost and/or time prohibitive. These are the two simplest and cheapest means of dealing with the problem, in addition to collecting and destroying the actual bugs and dead plants. In the Fall, all of the old plants and overgrown weeds need to be collected and removed from the garden. Leave the soil bare for a few days, then till the soil thoroughly to a depth of 6 to 8 inches. About 2 or 3 weeks after that, rake the soil and leave it bare for a few more days. This allows the birds to work on the beetles that are looking for a place to overwinter. Then plant a cover crop, such as clover which is a great natural fertilizer, or lay a 4 to 6 inch layer of organic mulch. In the early spring, about 2 weeks before planting, give the garden another tilling and leave it bare for the birds to work over again.

Here's what an adult Colorado Potato Beetle looks like:

Eewww.

Remember, there's a list of To Do's in the mailbox. Anytime you want to come out and tend the garden, just check the mailbox for what needs to be taken care of.