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Help! This is my first summer gardening, so I have no idea what to do. I'm growing some Dahlia 'Duet', which is red with white tips. I keep finding that bugs are eating off the white tips just as they emerge from the bud! You can see from the picture that they eat the tips and then stop. After all the tips are gone, they then take a litle break before devouring all of the petals (I'll post another picture of that). Any ideas for keeping pesky pests away from my blooms?
That is a beautiful flower. How strange that they are eating the white parts first. Smart bugs whatever they are. I am sorry I cannot help. I don't think I have ever grown dahlias. Maybe I should though as they are very pretty. I know someone will come along to help you out.
Yikes! I don't know the answer to your question. This is my first year growing Dahlias too (although not my first year gardening). Ours have not bloomed yet, so I haven't experienced the bugs eating the blooms thing. You might try posting this same question over on the Dahlia forum. I gotten lots of good and friendly advice over there.
Hi All,
I have dahlias but I haven't had trouble with the blooms being eaten. Try posting your question in the Dahlia forum. I'm sure someone over there could help you.
Jennifer
If you have a spray bottle, put a tsp of dishsoap in a quart of water and spray early in the morning, that should do the trick. Depends on the bug, but most times this works, and won't hurt your flowers. Right now, the Japaneese Bettles are nesting all down inside my Dalhias, I just pick them off and squish them! Or catch them and put them in a bowl of soapy water. Argh, they make me mad!
Hi guy's, dont have a clue about the beetle, we may have it here and call it something else, but the buds being eaten befor the flowers open is either earwigs or slugs, if it's slugs, I would have expected you to see the slime trails by now, if it's ear wigs, you can trap them in shreaded paper pocked inside a flower pot, place this upside down on a garden cane as close to the plant as pos, the earwigs hid in the paper/straw will also do, and in the morning, drown them all in a buchet of boiling water, or shake them out and stamp on them or, set fire to the paper in a can, they feed at night like the snails, and hid in daylight so the birds dont eat them. good luck, WeeNel.
Earwigs do that damage for me. It takes place very early as the flower is opening - hence the tips are gone but the rest is fine. They will more or less live in the flowers if it's not too hot, later eating some holes in the leaves or flower. Trapping of the earwigs is possible.
So, I'm pretty sure it's earwigs, not slugs. No signs of slug trails, and I've got earwigs that keep coming into my house, so I'm sure they're living in abundance in my yard. I found a Jerry Baker 'Earwig Elixir' recipe the other day, which consisted of garlic, water, and dish soap, and tried that on the dahlias. I'm not sure yet if it worked . . . I need to check again, and I'll let you know. If not, I'm going to try the dish soap thing, and then work on setting up traps for the earwigs. I have a dozen more dahlias that are will be flowering somewhat soon, and I really want to keep the earwigs far away from those!
WeeNel, Iike your clever little trap! Thanks for the advice.
1 whole head of garlic, chopped
2 drops dishwashing liquid
water
Place 1 cup of water and the garlic in a blender, and puree until smooth. Strain, then add the dishwashing liquid to the remaining liquid. Add enough water to make 1 quart of spray. Apply to earwig-infested flowers with a hand-held sprayer.
I still don't have a real report for this recipe yet, since I think the first time I sprayed it was onto young buds that already had the white tips chewed off. I just sprayed again, so maybe in a few days I can tell you what I find.
OK, here's my report on the Anti-Earwig Elixir. I think it helped a little bit, but not enough, as I still haven't seen a 'duet' with more than 50% of its white tips. I think that if I sprayed the dahlias every day it might keep the earwigs away, but if not, it's not that much of a help. Too bad!
We have a local garden guru that swears his home made traps get the earwigs. He makes them out of plastic bottles. If you are interested, I can send the instructions, or post them or whatever.
OK, you take an small water bottle (empty) and cut the top off about a quarter of the way below the neck. The top piece will look like a funnel. Put a small blob of tuna fish cat food in the bottom piece of the bottle. Turn the "funnel" piece over and put it back on (in) the bottle. (The bottle neck is now pointing toward the bottom of the bottle, but not touching the bottom.) Tape them together. He makes a kind of hanger out of paper clips and hangs them in the bushes, or you can just lay them on the ground.
During the night, the earwigs come out to feed. They go down the "funnel" and then can't find their way back out. (The opening is 'floating' in the middle of the trap)
He says you have to use tuna fish cat food, because that is the only kind they like. He's kind of goofy, but he's very popular (Ciscoe Morris). This was in the paper and if it sounds too confusing, I could try to post a link to it. I haven't tried to do that before tho. If you try it, I would be curious about the result. :-)
the same remedy with these traps work for slugs/snails etc, but add some beer instead of tuna, tuna will atract all the neibourhood cats if they smell it and boy, believe me, these guy's will know how to open the trap, do the toilet in your flower borders as a thank you and be in a line up for the next evening feed. these earwigs are a real pest at the bud/flowering stage of the plants, but we should remember that earwigs have a huge appatite for greenfly, white fly and a lot of other sap sucking insects that we dont want, the birds also love the juicey earwigs, so ballance is better than trying to kill everything in the garden. Good luck to all your trials, one will surely work out good. Weenel.
I have researched several home remedies on ear wigs and it seems like the easiest trap to use is a shallow dish with vegetable oil mixed with soya sauce...half and half?? Maybe try that?
The plastic bottle described by shune works great to trap slugs. I put about a tablespoon of Sluggo in it and it catches lots of slugs. Just put it in your garden near the plant to be protected, but place the trap with the opening a little lower than the bottom, or it will fill with water when it rains and dissolve or dilute your bait.
By the way, I forgot to mention, the earwigs are only active at night, they go for cover in daylight which is why you probably dont see them munching your plants in daylight, but if you open one of the chewed flowers, you will maybe find them hiding in the tightly packed flower buds, Good luck. WeeNel.
