Good thinking
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I think @Myfriendis410 is on to something.
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I don’t have experience with earthworms, thats my next adventure hopefully i attract some to my bins, but @Myfriendis410 suggestion sounds very logic
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Sounds like they don’t like to be in that soil. Earthworms are shy critters, hate lights, and would not come up to the surface unless it’s dire situation. what @Myfriendis410 suggested is very likely.
@Myfriendis410 @Ning This would make sense, the weather said no rain so I watered them because they where dry. Then got 2 days worth of rain right afterwards… The worms where all at the top of my pots and your comments make sense with wet soil. The ladies are not being effected by anything but obviously you dont want bad bugs around your ladies.
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This one was the worst with Gnats so some food grade DE was powdered on top along with the other 2.
No gnats that I could see after 2 days, so I removed the top 2 inches of soil/DE and replaced it with more super soil in the pot/watered with my Great White mycorrhizae which has some “Bacillus thuringiensis” in it for some extra soil strength.
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Gnats gone but still have other pests around! I check them daily for anything going wrong.
@Ning I’ve been using your spray recipe but it seems these pests are still going for my ladies the next day and its not like its raining/washing away what I spray on the girls. I really do get them all around. Suggestions?
Natures gonna be a pain, I just want to to do everything I can find to protect the babies <3
@Mrcrabs @dbrn32 @TXCanna @Ning @Myfriendis410 Thank you for replying!
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I use a horticulture screen when the loupers are bad. Spraying with a 50/50 solution of isopropyl alcohol works too only not in flower.
Haven’t grown weed outside yet. I usually spray an organic bug spray on my garden.
I use organic goats milk 
dilute 9:1 water to milk has work for me,
I’ve also neem oil and organocide in the past with great results, I also throw chicken scratch around my outdoor plants to attract birds not a lot just to attract, they will help with worms and crickets
Eww! I’d never seen any maggots(?) like that before. I noticed when I started composting next to my garden decades ago, lots of birds came to pick bugs or something in my compost pile. I noticed a lot less pest on my vegetables. They probably picked out bugs on the plants too. If they are resistant to capsaicin, maybe try spraying them with rubbing alcohol. Sorry, I never had this problem. Score so I don’t know the solutions. Where do you live? I’m in So CA and our dry weather helps lessen pests.
One thing I could think of is adding essential oil that repels bugs into the spray, like citronella, eucalyptus, lemongrass, peppermint. If you grow some of them, it might work pounding them in addition to garlic & chili peppers. Gotta experiment on it.
I live in Maine, right next to the border of New Hampshire.
It looks so far that the pepper spray is keeping away everything but the Grasshoppers. (I found 4 on my ladies the next morning)
I got some idea’s I’m gonna try that the internet has suggested. My plants are by no means dying but I HATE seeing holes in my leaves.
So those maggot-look-alike are grasshopper babies? I’d try increasing the garlic. They might have tough shell that the chili pepper couldn’t harm them. Most bugs hate the smell of garlic so even though it won’t kill them, it might Make the leaves unappetizing for them.
Whatever they are I have not seen them since. I want to assume the little bit of Bacillus thuringiensis bacteria given to these ladies has helped a little bit making them distasteful to insects. I also bought a cilantro plant and instead of making a garlic spray I made a garlic scent (chopped garlic in water, holes drilled in top of a mason jar) the grasshoppers won’t even enter my area anymore. But I have found more bugs that have started to overstay there welcome.
I also bought some of the Captain Jacks Dead Bug Spray which works ok keeping away the caterpillars and moth eggs, figured I would give it a try for $7.
This bugger will NOT go away my main enemy at the moment. “Candy-striped Leafhopper - They may cause some damage to these plants by sucking the juices from them. After enough meals, the Candy-striped Leafhopper can emit bubbles of liquid waste from its abdomen. This liquid retains some of the sweetness from the plant’s juice and is very attractive to a variety of other insects like wasps and flies.”
This juice they leave behind just attracts more of them including…
“Scorpion fly - harmless besides the name but enjoy sucking juices from plants/flowers.”
“Flower Fly - again they drink juice from plants BUT, Hover Fly larvae are predatory, however, and feed on pesky aphids - even smaller insects that breed rapidly and drain plants of their nutrition. Given the diet of the larvae and the harmless nature of the adult, Flower Flies are welcome guests in many gardens.”
So sometimes they are a victim of the sprays and I barely see them which I take as a good sign as many of them would tell me of a possible aphid problem from what I’ve read.
This was yesterday, a grasshopper shed its skin. I’ve noticed the garlic smell is not as strong as a week ago. Will need to change out every 6-7 days for maximum smell. And this I cant find ANYTHING of this beetle besides a possible Potato Beetle or here in maine there call FALSE potato beetles. I’ve watched these dudes just chilling it doesnt look like theyre eating anything but who knows? @Ning have you ever seen this in your garden.
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There isn’t a app that identifies bugs? They have one for just about everything these days
I used some website that listed all 700 species in my state and scrolled forever lol.
Honestly didnt think of checking a phone app.
Ah, I came home shortly for last two weekends to take care of stuffand my garden were overrun with spider mites and even some russet mites. They nearly kill my tomatoes and all of them were stunted. My mutant Gold Leaf is ten ft tall now. So much to do and I have to leave again tomorrow.
I pruned them anyway despite being in flowering stage because I can’t imagine how I’m gonna be able to manage the harvest. Tried to save as much as possible to dry and make salve and oil later. Never had so much work like this in the garden since I stupidly planted 65 tomato plants a long time ago.
Anyway, you might find this site useful to identify he bugs https://www.insectid.ento.vt.edu/insect-id/identify-pests/adult/beetles/#. I googled ‘beetle identifier’ and this VT link was the first one on the list.
I’ll be back next week and will have time to catch up.
So far I havnt seen as many bugs, the cilantro and garlic really work for the grasshoppers. Next year I’m building a little Polly tunnel for my ladies.
Update on the girls themselves -
INDOOR ILGM BLUE DREAM FEM is going along nicely doing some training on her. Mainly all experimental. How does she look?
OUTDOOR GROW
LIBERTY HAZE - finally came back from the nitrogen toxicity and has made new growths around the plant but still looks wicked sad.
GORILLA GLUE - growing like crazy but the bugs love to eat her the most! Thoughts?
SUPER LEMON HAZE - talked with the guy who I got the bag from and said it actually might be a bubblegum haze? We’ll wait and see when all is said and done. Keeping steady, bugs are on her but not as bad as the GORILLA GLUE.
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LINK TO INDOOR PLANT NUTE ISSUE
for myself so I don’t lose it later on.
