RE: [gardeners] Saturday in the garden
Dorsett (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Mon, 15 May 2000 10:33:12 -0500
Ron,
About those tobacco budworms:
Insecticides containing Bacillus thuringiensis/Bt (Thuricide, Dipel, etc.)
are effective biological controls when used on some plants, but not really
on geraniums. You might want to plant some petunias as a trap crop...and
spray them with Bt. The budworms eat more of the flower surface on
petunias, and ingest Bt as they nosh.
http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/CoopExt/PUBS/INSECT/05581.html
http://www.colostate.edu/Depts/CoopExt/TRA/PLANTS/gbworm.html
Eggs are deposited on leaves and buds: subspherical with a flattened base,
about 0.6 mm in diameter, and white or cream in color. They develop a
reddish-brown band just prior to hatching. Hatchlings eat leaf material for
a couple of days, then move into buds.
http://ipmwww.ncsu.edu/AG271/tobacco/budworms.html
Parasitic wasps are predators, Campoletis sonorensis, Cardiochiles
nigriceps, and several Polistes spp. paper wasps. Several diseases,
including the microsporidian Nosema heliothidis Lutz and Spendor, also
reduce budworm populations.
Barb in Southern Indiana Zone 5/6 dorsett@blueriver.net
A root is a flower that disdains fame.