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Ga.

Looks like aphid city outside in my patch.I saw a different species of insect yesterday when watering.From what I could tell,,it appears to be a green lacewing.I could never get close enough to catch one so I cant be 100% sure.I just read where they are an aphids worse nightmare.Heres what HGTV says "As an adult, the green lacewing feeds mostly on pollen and nectar, but in its larval stage, it's an aphid's worst enemy. Plus, lacewing larvae prey on other small, soft-bodied insects such as thrips, spider mites and mealybugs"
My question is should I break out the chemicals and spray,or should I give them a chance?

7/17/2003 7:42:42 AM

Nova Scotia

tough call. myself i would be a better safe than sorry person and kill everthing (those d*mned aphids got me this year) but on the other hand your soil and plant will do much better with less poisons in them if you can find a solution for your problem such as buying natural aphid predators (some place sell them i don't know were though?) good luck

7/17/2003 9:55:24 AM

Garden State Pumpkins

Easy decision...something is trying to eat your baby! It's war!! collateral damage happens...Make Love Canal look like a resort area!!! LOL...can't wait for naural biological control if the infestation is already there...unless you want to go out and buy a million ladybugs! Grow em Big! Chuck

7/17/2003 10:12:55 AM

Ga.

Chuck,,been battling them for last 2-3 weeks.Dang plants are so close to the cotton and pnuts,,but where I see majority of them is when I walk along where grass and tilled dirt are.I am keeping plants and grass sprayed on both sides of plants,,but seems the more I spray,the more I have.This ag growing is really depressing sometimes.G says move,damn,I really wish it were that easy.I noticed the lacewings a while back in small numbers,,but when I watered the 400's yesterday,,man,,there was tons of them flying off 400's.There doesnt appear to be as many aphids on the 400's as they are on the 75.I also picked close to 200 burgandy eggs from under leaves on the 75.I have been rotating insecticides every week,,3 different ones.The summer infestations are horrible here.

7/17/2003 10:41:58 AM

Ga.

I say I'm not 100% sure on it being lacewings,,but I am 85-95% sure as they are lots bigger than the aphids and their wings are lots bigger too..I also had to remove 7-8 leaves from stump outward because we had a dang windstorm yesterday.Rained to the north,south,east and west of me,,but only a small sprinkle with a hard north wind.501 Beachy is on north side,,no damage to it at all.400 is on south east side of the house and it got hit pretty hard.

7/17/2003 10:47:29 AM

[email protected]

Endeavor is a reduced risk pesticide that supposedly only kills aphids. I haven't used it nor do I sell it. But given the crowd that embraces it, I doubt much harm would come to beneficial predators. Try a Google on it.

7/17/2003 10:03:44 PM

porterville,california usa

Jeff;if it were me, i would use a different insecticide every day and at twice the strength until the only thing left breathing in my patch had hair growing out of it`s butt. kill`em all,let GOD sort`em out! if you really miss seeing little critters in the patch you can buy most any kind of bug you want from an "enviromentally safe" ag research company(commies and sierra club members), after you kill off everything else. i call it selective co-habitation in the patch. if that doesn`t work, there`s always the nuke option.LOL!!

7/18/2003 4:12:47 AM