?? Grasshopper Control

[Derald]

Nosema locustae. Anyone have experience with them?

[songbird]

is that the regular grasshopper? 3 inches or so long?

if so, yes, the snakes, bluebirds, turkeys and frogs eat them. we have some around all the time but they don't do enough damage for me to worry about. i like how they change their color to suit the background.

do you have lizards down there you can encourage? set up some birdbaths (but don't feed the birds) and keep them cleaned out and filled. even if the small birds can't manage the bigger grasshoppers they can reduce the population.

songbird

[Farm1]

If that is the insect that goes by the common name of 'locust', then yes, I do have experience of plagues of them.

The only thing I found that works is Molasses spray (I only use 'organic' sprays in my veg garden though). I can't give you a recipe though as the notebook that has that recipe in it apears to have gone walkabout. I'm sure you'll find a recipe online easily enough.

[phorbin]

To clarify, 'You want to know if anyone has used the microsporidian pathogen "Nosema locustae" (aka Nolo) as a control for grasshoppers and crickets.'

[songbird]

:) funny, funny, just found out the same thing.

and so my answer is no. haven't ever used them directly. looks to be a lot of studies out there on this one so plenty of good reading available already.

songbird

[songbird]

>

the unfortunate answer to most research on pest control and uses of any other organism to control it is that we just don't know everything. it would take an infinite amount of resources to find out. most people don't care they just want the problem species gone and screw the collateral damage.

songbird

[songbird]

:) s'ok. we get it figured out eventually.

songbird

[phorbin]

No, but as it happens I found it and looked into it when I was looking into predatory nematodes. -- One research project leads to another.

The general rule is that it is slow acting and not effective for home gardening due to the distances grasshoppers and locust can travel.

That ruled it out with prejudice for me because we just have an urban quarter acre.

It affects lepidoptera... It would seem commonsesical that using it in grasshopper bait would render the concern about killing off butterflies and moths a non-issue. ...with the caveat that what appears to be common sense isn't always the case.

I never did find anything in the literature that indicated an effect on other organisms. The literature may have changed since.

[Dick Adams]

I live in the Land of the damnyankee Snow. So tonight while it's freezing here, it'll be in the mid to high 60's where you live. But come spring and a new batch of insects are born, none of their ancestors will be around to greet them.

I figure it's a trade off damnyankees and insects. To minimize dealing with insects, you move north. To minimize, dealing with damnyankees, you move south.

[Farm1]

I have no idea whatsoever about how or why it works, but I do know that it did the only times I've used it - 2 or three times from memory.

They just didn't seem to like eating where I'd sprayed it which was all over the veg garden. there were still masses of them out in the rurrounding paddocks where the stock were and lots in the chooks orchard (where the chooks had a field day) but there were far, far less of them in my veg garden.

[Farm1]

In the case of locusts/grsshoppers taht would be an incredibly stupid stance to take. Birds which can be so easily the victim of 'collateral damage' or often THE best solution for gettign rid of garden insects.

[songbird]

in time y'all's decendents are going to be boat people or northerners again.

songbird

[songbird]

i know. that's why i asked Derald if he had bluebirds around (not bluejays). from his previous descriptions he has prime open field habitat for several families of bluebirds.

a few managed boxes would help his grasshopper and other insect control situation out quite a bit.

keeping bird baths filled and cleaned out once in a while for them will keep them in the area too.

we don't have bird houses up specifically for them, but they come through for the birdbaths pretty much every day during the summer. as they eat about 70% insects most of the bug season they do a great deal of picking about and hunting. we see them wrestling grasshoppers in the gravel quite a bit. funny as some of those hoppers about half as big as they are.

songbird

[songbird]

hm, those don't seem to be around here. they don't look familiar to me. as it seems by the description that they can do some damage too.

:)

good eatin'?

how is your garlic turning out?

songbird

[Farm1]

It was just molasses dissolved in water (that much I do recall), but I don't recall the proportions - perhaps 10%????. And the reason why I tried it was that I had a huge buket of molasses left over form either the horses or the cattle so I didn't waste any money on it either ;-))

I've

Ducks are much less damaging - they tread on things rather than scratching them out as do chooks. Mind you, both do some damage.

[songbird]

ok, still might be worth trying some birdbaths and see what happens. it being hot and dry where you are at in the mid-summer you might still lure them into the garden area from the surrounding open areas.

:) i'll take a look at it.

around here a mowed field is asking for dandelion, crab grass, etc. invasion.

songbird

[songbird]

ok, i'll mark it so people can ignore it. i like the color or illustration it provides. :)

*grin* good for a bit of fun.

ima mutt. half italian, quarter (english/3parts, scottish/1part) and last quarter unknown, rumored to be mix of native and german, but not too likely to ever be known.

:) thanks for the laugh, never heard that term before.

i lived in the hills of TN for a few years and then came back north when it was clear i was spending way too much time on the road driving to visit. no regrets other than i really miss Asheville, hiking in the hills and swimming in the resevoir.

my dad, step-ma, step-sister are much further south than you are there on the gulf side (down in everglade city). they'll be boat people too eventually or have to migrate north as the water levels rise. or perhaps they'll all get 'et by anacondas. i wonder how long it will be before we start eating those buggers as they are growing so fast...

and no, i'm not volunteering to go harvest them puppies either. i like snakes, but i also know when i've met my match.

songbird

[Steve Peek]

Steve "If it's tourist season, why can't we shoot them?"

[phorbin]

OK... If you haven't done so before, you might look into bacillus thuringensis Israelensis dunks.

London ON uses it to control the mosquito vector of the West Nile Virus.

[phorbin]

These days my attention is so taken with politics (bad guys in power in Canada) that its no surprise I missed it. -- I need a vacation or maybe my hands stuffed in gloves and locked to a wall for a few days and/or maybe a nap or fifteen or maybe a regimen of bacopa monnieri to improve the little grey cells.

They don't seem to object to their own floaters in the bathing pool.

Likely BT Israelensis.

They used to spray here but gave it up years ago.

Me too. I hate participating in the grand experiment designed to make insects impossible to kill. That said, the only other way I can think of to deal with the problem mosquitos present is by immunizing us to the mosquito borne diseases.

Just try to get government to move on this one. -- In Canada anyhow.