This year has been horrible with Japanese Beetles.  They have destroyed all of the leaves on our fruit trees, ate up all of our blackberrys, destroyed all of our grape vines, and are now working on destroying our raspberry bushes.

How do you get rid of these things? We've tried the bag-a-bug bags that you hang on your fence to catch them..
.and we fill them up every day, but more bugs keep coming.  Thought about dusting the trees and plants with Seven Dust, but we have bees and I don't want to start killing them off also.

Any ideas?

Oh wait, you said Japanese beetles...

My bad!

Do you use grub control on your lawn?    

Some say the bag traps actually attract more bugs because they give off pheromones.

You probably are not going to get rid of them this year, but you can start using grub control and stopping the life cycle for next year.

Also try getting your neighbors on board with grub control if you have nearby lawns.

(Not an expert at all on bugs)

Grub control for next year, liquid 7 for now to salvage what you can

We have them bad as well.  Some of my hives are 10 feet from the blackberries.  Will spray with liquid sevin tonight, after foragers have returned.  Not to many options at this point.

Some say pharamone traps attract more beetles than they catch.

A couple of years back we had a massive Japanese beetle infestation like the OP is describing.  They were stripping the rose bushes, fruit trees and ornamental shrubs bare.  I used liquid Sevin in a hose end sprayer to soak the plants and literally had mounds of dead beetles under the weeping cherry trees.  They were even eating the multi flora rose bushes.  The local horticulturalist recommended against the bait traps saying they draw more beetles than they kill.  They must be cyclical because I have not seen a hatch like that since.

They were all over my fruit trees a couple weeks back.  I got a new two gallon sprayer, and sprayed them with dawn dish detergent/water mixer.  They fell off the tree pretty fast.  I don't know if it killed em or just drove em nuts, but they did fall.  I didn't notice a return the next few days, so it did something to them.  The extension office suggested pulling them off by hand early in the morning and throwing them into a soapy bucket of water.  I think my way was faster, and more fun....

The Extension trials showed good results with BT's, and BT based "Beetlegone". Pretty much hammered the BM stink bugs too.
BT's are about as Bee safe as it gets, and we even use them during bloom with no issues, as long as they are applied at dusk to night.

The SWD fly is early this year, and are going to be after the cane fruit at the same time as the beetles if the GDD projections hold.

Good luck!

This is the real problem.  These little bastards are mobile. You could kill off every last one of them on your property, and by the next day their reinforcements would take their place and then some.

I live in a very rural area, and have been gardening successfully for over thirty years.  I have barely made a crop the last two.  This is an under-reported shore-'nuff agricultural crisis.

Here is the answer you all seek.

My dad and I treated for Japanese beetles with this stuff back in 2005.. It's time to do it again, and you have to do it for three years, but best get a handle on it now.

You'll thank me..

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milky_spore

Haven't seen hardly ANY beetles for two years around his garden before he died.

If you can stand them guinea fowl will do a number on them.
I had 30 of them and they kept the place bug free for years.
We have replaced them with turkeys and pea hens which are less predator bait prone but they dont do nearly as well.

milky spore+NEMATODES

nematodes is where its at.

Here is the page for BeetleGone

I'm guessing they do some type of culture to multiply the BT.  If you check out the page it looks like they had a failure of the process and are waiting for more to become available.  "*NOTE: DUE TO MANUFACTURING DELAYS BEYOND OUR CONTROL, grubGONE! & beetleGONE! WILL NOT BE AVAILABLE ANYWHERE IN THE COUNTRY UNTIL MID-LATE JULY. "  So I bet it's not as easy to do as a yeast culture done at home.

They also claim this particular strain of BT "galleriae" will work later in the life cycle.  "Unlike other biological or chemical beetle control products that are only effective against smaller 1st-instar pests, beetleGONE! is an effective control of the larger, later 2nd- and 3rd-instar beetles, and can therefore be used as a curative treatment for beetle control as well as a preventative treatment. "  This is a good thing.

As a grower this is another promising addition to the arsenal.  Thanks for posting this S-28!  I was familiar with the Kurstaki strain but not this one.

Strangely enough, ours are gone.  Poof.  Just like that.

For the last two weeks, all the way up until yesterday, there have been clouds of them out there.  Couldn't walk out back without batting them out of your face.  Today, I would be hard-pressed to take a stroll through what's left of the garden and count fifty of them.

The only place where I have a problem with them is on grape vines. I should get rid of the grape vines because I get
very few grapes. It does look pretty growing on the fence.

I hope my tree can recover.  Moving into this place just a few weeks ago and not knowing about the threat I've lost a bunch of ground.

These are from yesterday.

I used Seven spray to get them off my tree.  They still did a lot of damage before I finally got em.

I have two beekeepers in the area and plan to get my own hive.  Can't use Seven as it'll kill bees.

 

What about the NEEM oil?  does that harm bees?  It was also suggested for Jap beetles.

Another home remedy I saw was redcedar oil, soak a bunch of redcedar pieces in a bucket of water, and spray the water on leaves.
However here cedar is more expensive than buying new trees every year.

A 3rd option was to collect the dead beetles in a bucket of water, supposedly other beetles will stay away from the smell of dead beetles.

I was reading the label of one little product, $8 for 4oz of active ingredient : "mineral oil" ???

We tried those traps once.  They filled up faster than we could replace them, and I saw a LOT more beetles because of the traps (as others have said.)

So we took the traps down.  We have been working to create a garden that doesn't need pesticides or chemicals to thrive.  We have been reading a lot on companion planting and beneficial insects.  One source I highly recommend is, "Attracting Beneficial Bugs to Your Garden" by Jessica Walliser.

I'll shorten some of the advice on beneficial bugs here (specifically if they were mentioned for Japanese beetles):

Predatory wasps:  Adult wasps need nectar and pollen.  Plant these types of plants to attract:  angelica, anise, asters, baccharis, black-eyed susan, boneset, buckwheat, caraway, chamomile, cilantro, cinquefoil, coreopsis, cosmos, culver's root, daisies, eriogonum, golden alexanders, goldenrod, heliopsis, laceflower, lovage, meadowsweet, mountain mint, oregano, phacelia, sweet alyssum, verbena, yarrow, and yellow coneflower

Predatory stink bugs:  Attracted to landscape that has plenty of cover and prey diversity

Robber flies:  Habitat is key.  Provide a diverse landscape with many types of plants

Tachinid flies:  Adults depend on nectar and pollen.  Similar to wasps, plant: angelica, anise, aster, black-eyed susan, boltonia, boneset, buckwheat, calamint, chamomile, cilantro, cosmos, daisies, dill, eriogonum, feverfew, heliopsis, lovage, oregano, phacelia, sweet alyssum, and yellow coneflower



I can tell you that we still have Japanese beetles come through the garden, but not very many and not nearly the damage we have seen before.  I know for sure that my wife has planted: cilantro, daisies, goldenrod, lovage, several types of mint, oregano, yarrow, and dill.  I have seen wasps, stink bugs, and tachinid flies for sure.  I think we have robber flies as well.  (We have a ton of good bugs.  We even ordered lady bugs and lacewings to get rid of aphids and other pests).  We have a ton of other herbs and vegetables that are doing well.  We have also tried to get rid of landscaping that attracts certain pests (specifically mosquitoes) and seen improvements in our outdoor environment.  Pesticides kill everything.  Grow an environment that attracts beneficial insects and you will see an improvement.

Yes, neem oil will kill bees on contact. Contact being key word. Use neem oil in late evening, when bees are done for the night.

Are they soft bodied? If so, could use insecticide soap.

I have used Sevin spray on our Apple trees and Rose-of-Sharon bushes for the last 2 years. I need to spray the last week in June to prevent damage the following week when they appear here. The Japanese Beetles don't seem to care about anything other than those two plants.

I've fought the bastards for years.  I haven't done the milky spore thing (heard mixed reports).  Some years are worse than others.  And as you noticed, some plants get hammered more than others.  I have a American Linden that get pounded by Jap Beetles.  As does a plum tree.  One variety of raspberry gets hit hard, but the other variety beside it not so much.  When the beetles are light, I just put some water and a bit of dish soap into a old yogurt tub then knock the beetles in.  Kills em quick, and I don't have to spray my berries.  I don't like spray on my food.

I can verify one thing:  Beetle traps work very very well, but they attract more than they trap.  The proper way to use a beetle trap is to buy one for your neighbors.  

I usually spray the Linden with sevin.  That knocks them down pretty fast.  It doesnt eliminate them, but there are noticeably fewer on my raspberries after the Sevin application.

I know it's already been mentioned, but I'm just going to reiterate the importance of taking beneficial insects into consideration... I lost 3 of my 4 beehives within the last 2 weeks, most certainly from a careless pesticide application by somebody.

Sorry to hear that.  For being completely dependent on bees, people sure aren't supporting of them.  We get mad when the city sprays insecticide to kill mosquitoes because it probably kills other good bugs that we are trying to keep (in addition to our bees).

We actually grow dandelions, milkweed, and other so-called "weeds" because they are so beneficial to bees (and people).  Good luck with your next hives.

Wait, you mean that most peoples' lawns are NOT 100% pure dandelion? That's all I've got .

 


I just tell the wife its for survival: dandelions are edible. Its like growing 2 acres of lettuce

Something just killed my 3" diameter red oak tree in my front yard.  Because of its location between power lines and my house, I'm having to pay a tree removal service $1300 to cut it down and remove it.

I had some pruning that needed to be done, and a tree that was too close to a main line wire for my liking (that feeds my house, high voltage line is on my property) so I called the coop and they sent a truck down to cut the lines to my house. I cut down the trees, they hooked me back up. No charge for the coop to come out and do it, cost me about $4 in gas and oil to run the saw.

 

May want to look into it, if the situation is appropriate.

I've gotta do something about them around here.  They've been tearing roses to pieces on my block.  What's the proper concentration of Dawn soap to spray my roses with?

We used the bug bags several years ago when we had an absolutely biblical outbreak.  We would change bags twice a day sometimes.  Each year there have been fewer and fewer japanese beetles around.  I think we're up to our fourth bag for the year this year (we have two out at a time) and I doubt we'll have to put out any more.