Comments on: Bt: the Organic Caterpillar Control that Works Naturally

By: Thomas Wagner Nielsen

Thomas Wagner Nielsen — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 08:21:38 +0000

The caterpillar in the picture looks exactly like the ones that consumed most of my white mustard crop last year, so it’s nice to learn about B.T. I didn’t try picking them by hand, maybe I’ll give that a try first should they appear this year to. Good article, thanks!

By: James

James — Tue, 29 Jul 2008 11:48:02 +0000

I wish I knew about this stuff last fall when the cabbage loopers wiped me out. Good to know!

By: Kenny Point

Kenny Point — Mon, 28 Jul 2008 03:39:36 +0000

Hi Terie, was it “Fire Blight?” If so the first recommendation would be to plant varieties that are Fire Blight resistant. Then remove diseased limbs if the blight does show up, being careful to sterilize your pruners to avoid spreading the blight. There are organic products used to combat fire blight such as Streptomycin, Myco-Shield, and BlightBan.

By: Terie

Terie — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 00:56:31 +0000

This is really great to know. This year I have a problem with japanese bettles, although not as bad as previous years, just a few. I also have seen big black ants and some other little bugs that live on the leaves of my grape plant and the tomato plant also has leaf bugs, don’t know what they are.

Do you know if there’s anything safe to use as a fungicide? I have a few plants that can’t seem to recover, one pear tree I had to literally cut down because of something called Fire ??? um, oh I forget, some kind of fungus that kills plants if not treated.

anyway, thanks for the BT tip, maybe I’ll try it for those darn flies that keep on growing in my trash can area.

By: GardenGuru

GardenGuru — Fri, 25 Jul 2008 19:31:26 +0000

Luckily I haven't had too much of a problem with bugs this year. I'm currently planting a liriope groundcover across my backyard. So far everything's going pretty well. It's already pretty lush.

By: Kitt

Kitt — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 06:58:42 +0000

I haven’t yet had to resort to Bt to tackle pests in my vegetable garden, but I’m sure glad to have it in the form of mosquito dunks for my little water feature (a jumbo porcelain pot with some water plants and a little fountain).

If you have standing water in your garden (such as in a rain barrel or pond), you’ll want to make sure it doesn’t become breeding grounds for skeeters.