Squash Bug Invasion

And all this time I thought a squash bug was any 'ol bug that you had stepped on. I was educated this past week when I saw fluid dripping from one of my gourd vines.

Stuff dripping from your plants are never a good sign and usually indicates something is about to die. It would be either the plant or the critter causing the plant such distress.

The first thing we saw were the eggs under some of the leaves.  These little "footballs" will hatch into baby squash bugs that will, in turn, eat. What they eat is the gourd plant or more precisely the gourd plant juice.

Any bug mess'n with my gourds is risking it's life.

There are all kinds of things to do for squash bugs and I found that most of the recommendations don't work.  I sprayed with Sevin.  Sprayed again and still the place looked like a union meeting of Squash Bug Local 86.

So these little gourd suckers were causing big problems with my gourd plants and I wasn't having much luck sending them to SBH (Squash Bug Heaven).

After 2 bottles of Sevin I had to admit they were getting the best of me so we reached out for some help. Ginger went to the nursery and asked their resident, "how does she know all this stuff," cops wife and all around nice lady, Mona.

Of course Mona knew what to do. She said we should take an hour and look at each leaf, paying special attention to the underside.  Also look on the vines. If we found eggs or hatchling's we should take some duct tape and press it to the eggs or hatchling's. The gourd leaves and vines/stalks have little "hairs" on them so things can't stick very well and when applying the duct tape they are easily removed and permanently stuck to the tape.

Now, if you come across an adult you do just like the name implies... you squash it, splat it, mash it, stomp on it, squish it and if you want you can duct tape it... just don't let any of them out alive.

That's what we did and it was amazing the number of eggs we found as well as hatchling's. Since the duct tape roundup I haven't found a single egg or squash bug anywhere. 

I'll keep my duct tape handy and will inspect regularly.  It's a pretty easy fix once you know what your supposed to do about the critters.

I love a story with a sad ending... for squash bugs.

Whoohoo.