Free Naturally Bug-Free by Anna Hess Page B

vegetable oil or Bt to the tips of ears when silks start to show, or by planting varieties with tight ear tips.
     
    Spotted (left) and striped (right) cucumber beetles are problematic because they carry bacterial wilt disease. Photo credit: http://www2.ca.uky.edu/entomology/entfacts/ef311.asp.
     
    Cucumber beetles include two species: striped cucumber beetles ( Acalymma vittata ) and spotted cucumber beetles ( Diabrotica undecimpunctata howardi ). Both feed on melon and cucumber plants, transferring a bacterial disease known as wilt to the vegetables. Bacterial wilt symptoms begin with wilting of the leaves, followed by death of the plant. For a definitive diagnosis, cut the plant's stem and squeeze the cut ends; if the plant has succumbed to bacterial wilt, a sticky sap will ooze out and will form a long thread when you touch the two cut ends back together and then slowly pull them apart again.
    Mother Earth News gardeners recommend hand-picking cucumber beetles, treating with neem oil, cleaning up the garden to prevent overwintering locations, and utilizing poultry, row covers, companion planting, and yellow sticky traps. I simply succession plant my cucumbers, don't plant cantaloupes, and choose resistant varieties of both cucumbers and watermelons. (You can read about resistant varieties in chapter 6.)
     
    Cutworms are caterpillars (top photo) that live in the soil and feed on young plants. When digging in the summer garden, you often find these species in the form of pupae (bottom photo), which are easy to remove and feed to your chickens.
    Cutworms are often invisible in the garden since they live in the soil, but you'll know you have these pesky caterpillars if your seedlings are beheaded in the night. Cutworms belong to any of several species of moths, but the most common in North American gardens is usually the variegated cutworm ( Peridroma saucia ). Mother Earth News gardeners recommend making little collars around the bases of seedlings to protect them from damage, cultivating soil before planting, or setting out larger seedings. Natural predators seem to keep cutworms under control in our garden during most years.
     
    A grasshopper sheds its tough skin like a snake does, allowing the insect to grow larger.
    Grasshoppers included a number of species that eat leaves, but are rarely a problem in the vegetable garden. Most pest grasshoppers are members of the genus Melanoplus , including two-striped grasshoppers ( M. bivittatus ), differential grasshoppers ( M. differentialis ), migratory grasshoppers ( M. sanguinipes ), and redlegged grasshoppers ( M. femurrubrum ). Besides eating grass, grasshoppers enjoy the leaves of beans, leafy greens, and corn. Mother Earth News gardeners treat grasshopper infestations with hungry chickens and guinea fowl.
     
    Japanese beetles often congregate in clusters as males compete to mate with a female.
    Japanese beetles ( Popillia japonica ) are iridescent insects that come out for a couple of months in the summer, during which time they can completely defoliate their favorite plants (especially roses, grapes, and cherries). During the rest of the year, Japanese beetles live as white grubs in the soil, where they do some damage feeding on plant roots.
    My primary control method is hand-picking the adult insects, along with choosing plant species that are less attractive (which I'll explain in more depth in chapter 6). Mother Earth News gardeners add the use of trap crops, chickens, guinea fowl, ducks, robins, and bluebirds. In particular, they recommend letting birds work over the ground in late spring when beetle larvae are close to the surface and can be easily scratched up.
     
    The spotted garden slug eats decaying leaves and fungi, other slugs, and young garden plants. Photo credit: Phil Nixon, University of Illinois Extension.
     
    Slugs (and their shelled relatives, snails) tend to top the list of problematic pests in areas that stay cool and damp during the summer,