Posted: 2/28/2014 3:33:47 PM EDT
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My garden does nicely but each year it gets infested with jap beetles.Miserable bugs get all over my plants and getting them under control is time consuming.I hear people talk about chickens eating them and wondered if any of you have experience with them as bug control and how effective are they.
I realize chickens will require effort to keep and I have thought of getting them for other reasons,eggs and meat,feathers for fly tying would be nice too.I just want to see if bug eating is something I can utilize. |
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Speaking from experience chickens will do more harm than good in your garden. I always try to be as organic as possible but that does not always work. Instead of chickens maybe you could put bird feeders near your garden but do not keep it filled up after a few weeks. That will get the birds scouting the area and they will pick off the grubs that the JB starts as along with other insects. Give diatomaceous earth a try but with large infestations or lots of rainfall that may seem futile. Imidacloprid can be used to treat grubs early.
Eta but do get chickens! Compost the manure year round and eat those eggs! |
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Quoted:
Just what harm to gardens do chickens do? They will dig in your plants and eat EVERYTHING in sight. I learned this the hard way and lost a whole garden. I put up a temporary fence last year and it mostly worked. I let them in occasionly and they ate the veggies before they ate bugs. |
| I was watching a series of permaculture videos and what the guy did was put his chicken coop/run around his peach tree. Apparently the japanese beetles were more attracted to the peach tree than anything else, so he'd just go in the morning when the tree was covered and shake all the beetles off and they'd fall into the chicken run and be eaten. Perhaps you could do something similar? In my garden the japanese beetles seem to prefer either the plum tree or the raspberry plants. Both have so much foliage it isn't too big of a deal (I have probably a hundred raspberry canes so the damage was spread thin), and better those than my leafy greens or other plants. |
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Quoted:
My garden does nicely but each year it gets infested with jap beetles.Miserable bugs get all over my plants and getting them under control is time consuming.I hear people talk about chickens eating them and wondered if any of you have experience with them as bug control and how effective are they. I realize chickens will require effort to keep and I have thought of getting them for other reasons,eggs and meat,feathers for fly tying would be nice too.I just want to see if bug eating is something I can utilize. Chickens will, in most instances, destroy your garden. They will eat the plants. They will dig them up. They will take dirt baths in the rows, destroying more plants. Now...if they have your entire acreage to run on, and only sometimes go in the garden, you will have less of this. But you will not have tomatoes without holes in them (chickens love tomatoes) and basically, anything the chickens find yummy, you will not get for yourself. Chickens are omnivores. They eat anything that looks or tastes good to them. Your plants will taste good. |
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Depending on your plantings the chickens may eat more than the beetles. Guinea Fowl are supposed to be less damaging in that regard (and better insect eaters) but are considerably noisier. Guineas are fun, and yes noisier, but they are terrific for cutting down insects. I don't know about the beetles, but you won't have ticks if you keep guineas. Guineas think ticks are megalicious. |
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With the last few winters having been fairly mild the jap beetles seem to overwinter very well.Since this winter has been very long and very cold I'm hoping it will knock down the survival rate of the grubs in the ground.
Chickens could range around the property eating whatever they find,and if it knocks down the jap beetles further,fine. It doesn't sound like I'll be letting them in my gardens though.I do place bird feeders in the garden and it does help but the jap beetles seem to come from a carrier cruising somewhere just out of range,wave after wave keeps coming.Anyway,I plan on keeping up the battle and trying news weapons.Thanks for the replies. |
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We had 1 leghorn hen that got out about 2 years ago.
She absolutely destroyed the garden. I had no peppers or beans. I ended up finding her roosting spot and taking her out with a machete. I was so disgusted with that chicken, I didn't even bother processing her or feeding her to the dogs. Just tossed her worthless carcass in the woods. Garden + no chickens = success Garden + chickens = fail. |
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Chickens don't particularly care for Japanese Beetles. They do, however, love garden veggies.
We've been battling increasing numbers of JB for the last few years, and have yet to find anything truly effective. The more you kill off or remove from your property, the more fly in from the neighbors. About the only thing that has done any good at all is to go out early every morning, knock off as many as you can and smash 'em. |
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Two words: chicken moat
http://www.motherearthnews.com/homesteading-and-livestock/garden-pest-control-zmaz88mjzgoe.aspx |