Monday, May 23, 2016

Pumpkins vs. cucumber beetles: Natural pest control.

Yesterday, while Eric secured the roof for the upcoming solar panel installation, Teresa was busy in the garden.  After a morning of digging, over 250 pumpkin and gourd seedlings were planted in 3 out of the 4 garden beds.  Needless to say, there will be a TON of pumpkins this fall, assuming the cucumber beetles don't attack. 
Which leads us to our second project:  Cucumber Beetle Traps
One of the challenges of organic gardening is dealing with pest control.  With all these plants this year, there is likely no way we can keep up with hand picking off the beetles.  We bought some Tanglefoot (a sticky paste), orange paint, and wood sticks.  We dipped the sticks in the paint yesterday and then will cover them with the tanglefoot and place them in the garden.  Apparently the beetles are attracted to orange color, which closely resembles the pumpkin flowers.  They should then find themselves stuck to the sticks. 

We will see how it works.  Fingers crossed!

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