24,795 Garden Web Discussions | Vegetable Gardening

Aphids can by hosed off most plant with just a stream of water. You may have to do it 3 or 4 days in a row to get ahead of them. You can also just run your fingers up and down the stems or on the leaves and squish as you go and rinse with the hose or a spray bottle filled with water and set to spray on Stream.
Make sure you aren't over-using high nitrogen fertilizers as it very attractive to them.
Dave

Thanks. But again, these are mostly just one sentence jab-and-go instructions. When I look more carefully, I see someone suggesting that, once the larva is found, to stab the vine in 1cm intervals around it in a line, and then go back and do the same thing 90 degrees around the vine. Someone else says to stab once with a toothpick and leave the toothpick in (!?) Someone else says to stab the vine at an angle so it penetrates the larva more or less lengthwise. If you stab the larva once anywhere, does that kill it?
The surgery option, which calls for removal of the larva, really doesn't make a lot of sense to me. If you know where it is, why extract it? Just stab it and leave it. Or is the stem compromised by having a dead larva in it? Seems to me that slicing the stem is going to be vastly more damaging to the plant than sticking a pin or a wire through it.
A number of people claim this stabbing method to be unsuccessful. Why might that be? Because you don't really know where it is? If you don't know where it is, what are you going to do with a knife?

I agree, more info would be great - even for the slice the vine thing. There are often many of them in the vines. I know there were other posters commenting recently on removing many of them, hopefully they can chime in on how they found them, and someone can try stabbing one and seeing what it takes to kill it....
I think part of the reason any of these methods are unsuccessful is because by the time they are tried the plant is already wilting and severely damaged and killing the larva can't undo that. In fact, by the time people slit the stem, they probably wind up doing more damage than the borer.



Indeed, Farmerdill is a corn guru! Great list! I appreciate listing of days until harvest, as the season is growing short. If I can track down some Silver Duchess or Silver Princess, that sounds like the way to go.
Thanks to everyone for their input. On to my next corn growing question.


Its a Cicada

Catherine, you can use anything around the house to stop most, if not all of the water leaking out. A flattened can, heavy plastic (such a little bit won't leach much), duct tape, a piece of wood. I have the opposite problem. Hubby didn't want to destroy the tank, so he made itty bitty holes and now my zucchini is turning black and moldy from too much water sitting at their roots. Who knew this would be the "Year of Water" ?

<Of course......you realize that as soon as I plug up some of the holes, there will be a drought, right? ;)>
Yep - It's Murphy's Law of Gardening. :-) Just like the years I make raised mounds for the plants in the garden because of the overly wet previous year we have a drought and the years I leave the beds flat and smooth it pours rain like gang busters.
Just don't wedge them in too tight and then, if needed, maybe you can pull a couple if needed.
Dave


How old are your plants Mike? IME cuke plants have a fairly short harvest window of 4-6 weeks. I plant seeds in early May, start harvesting in early July, and by early to mid August the plants are toast. If I want cukes until fall I will start a second planting in late June so that they start producing about the time the first planting is done.



rgreen48: You know, I was thinking exactly the same thing. The next time I make them, and there will be a next time soon, I want to try them without egg too. With the egg they certainly are delicious and remind me of Korean style scallion pancakes (well just a little bit, not totally). I suppose the proportion of flour would have to be a little higher to be able to bind and I would use water to make a very thick batter and fold and work the flowers and herbs and seasonings in. I will post when I do make them again. I hope you enjoy making them and having them. We do love to eat don't we!
K.

LOL yea I figure the soil bed is probably too shallow. I had an old 3-tier util cart that I upcycled as a vertical planter, but I guess the depth of the shelves just don't really work out too well LOL My next gardening project is a real raised bed garden, 12" or 16" in deep - will try the lettuce and kales again


Morgan wrote: > Some of the older growth has begun to yellow and a couple leaves have died...
Some of the leaves of my cucumbers also died.
Please check my thread Cucumbers support to see what I did to solve the problem.






Normally I said go with new plants but given the weather this year if you have been lucky enough to keep your plants healthy I'd be inclined to give keeping them and trying it. As an alternative, you could do a bit of both, keep the best ones going but put some new ones in as well. That way you are covered.
Dave