Cabbage worms

[tbow388]

I have cabbage worms and it is bad. I have had to pull and throw away some heads. What can I spray or do? They are also on some of my broccoli.

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

Your safest answer is Bacillus Thuringiensis or BT for short. It is a biological pesticide, not harmful to you, but deadly to the cabbage worm. It is a bacteria that they eat then it kills them. Check it out online and you should be able to buy it at a local Ag store, if not easily ordered online. You can buy the premixed in water or buy the powder and mix it yourself then put it in a sprayer and put in on all your cole crops. Your other alternative are handpicking the worms off or a serious poison such as Sevin. The small white butterflies you see around your garden are the culprit. If you turn over some of the cabbage leaves you will probably see some yellow/orangish spots attached to the leaves, they are the eggs that are being laid by those small butterflies or moths, they are what hatches into your green worms. Good luck with getting rid of them. Again, I would recommend the BT.

 

[tbow388]

Thanks a million dusty. Ready that, went and got some that I could a mix and spray and then sprayed the hell out of it. I also ready that it helps with tomato worms later.

Now another question. The same holes in the cabbage and broccoli leaves are on my blue lake beans. Does it spread to those? I sprayed them also.

This is a time I wish I had dels or another big growers number since they grow so much of it. Not many people grow cole crops here

 

[luckydozenfarm]

Bt can be used on any chewing caterpillar. It's good stuff. They call it Dipel here. Its in dust or liquid formulation.

 

[steve md]

Thanks a million dusty. Ready that, went and got some that I could a mix and spray and then sprayed the hell out of it. I also ready that it helps with tomato worms later.

Now another question. The same holes in the cabbage and broccoli leaves are on my blue lake beans. Does it spread to those? I sprayed them also.

This is a time I wish I had dels or another big growers number since they grow so much of it. Not many people grow cole crops here

you may have Mexican bean beetles.look on the underside of the leaves for yellow larva. the adults are brown with spots on them.not sure what insecticide to use but I just crush the yellow larve on the underside of the leaves that cause the damage .

 

[Dusty Rhodes]

Well, I have learned something relative to beans! Alas, we are resting our ground this year. I miss my spring gardening. But will be gone a good bit this summer and so we decided to mulch and amend our soil and not worry about putting a garden in this year. Good luck with all your gardening endevours!

 

[tbow388]

Beans

Your beans probably have flea beetles and BT is only toxic to caterpillars.

A non toxic for flea beetles is DE (diatomaceous earth) agricultural grade. It's a dust. Look into buying a Dustin' Miser duster. I've used one for decades. The dustin miser works with the powdered BT formulations also. Also a coffee can with small holes poked in it works for dusting. The old style metal cans with an extra lid work great as they can be stored well when not in use.

I have been spraying everything with Malathion. Does that work for the Flea Beetles?

 

[chuckwood]

use Sevin

I have been spraying everything with Malathion. Does that work for the Flea Beetles?

Malathion is not a good idea for use with veggies. Sevin is a much better alternative, it's much more
biodegradable and not as toxic. Even better is a plant based pesticide like the pyrethrins, nicotine (hard to get now), or rotenone.

 

[Dalmatian90]

nicotine (hard to get now), or rotenone.

Nicotine was taken off the list of approved organics a few years ago, which probably knocked a lot of the wind out of whatever commercial business there was for it.

Rotenone is getting scarcer -- basically in 2006 the companies that made it filed voluntarily with the EPA asking that they revoke the approval for it as a pesticide for everything but fish, with the provision that existing inventories could be sold off. So in theory everything that says "Rotenone" in the stores right now is new old stock. Wildlife agencies *really* like it for dealing with invasive species (they kill off everything in the pond, then re-introduce native species) so that's why its still allowed for fish.

On the organic side I believe it has been (or at least strongly considered) to like nicotine be declared a "Prohibited Natural Substance" mainly so they can prohibit importing fruits & vegetables treated with it overseas where it is still legal (hello China) as organic.

I do toy with the idea every so often of growing my own tobacco so I can brew my own nicotine insecticide, just because.

Rotenone was de-listed because of new research that showed a link to Parkinson's disease. Nicotine as..."too toxic"...and the cynic in me wonders if it was because Bayer had developed a synthetic version class called "neonicotinoids" and the whole kerfuffle over colony collapse disorder got used at least in the short term to eliminate the pesticide you could grow yourself to protect the commercial product for a while till it eventually gets banned.