Ruud Kleinpaste: Keep your eyes open and stay vigilant in the garden

I’m proud of Jack. His gardening skills are increasing, with useful observations every day. Last week it was Passionvine hoppers, and they are indeed showing an upward trend.  

The window for control ceased in Spring (spraying the tiny fluffy bums with a simple fly spray) but for now there is little you can do until March/April, when you look for the distinctive egg patterns laid on thin, woody twigs by adult female hoppers:  

In Autumn cut off those dead and dying twiglets with eggs and burn them in the fireplace. Saves you from a heap of fluffybums being born next spring. 

Something many gardeners don’t often see early enough is the beginning of Powdery Mildew. White powdery fungal deposits on leaves of cucumbers, pumpkin, squash, oak trees, hydrangeas, beans, grapes, apples, pears, rose – it’s on a lot of different plants.  

Most gardeners find the symptoms too late. If you keep your eyes open you can find it starting right now in small patches on the leaves.  

The cause: long-term moisture on surfaces of leaves/plants or a dry spell followed by relative humidity and dew.  

For instance, when you have warm days and cool nights, you get dew, condensation!  

The name says it all: “Powdery Mildew”. The small white patches are a dead give-away, and so is the presence of characteristic black-and-yellow ladybird beetles – they spread the fungal spores around. 

Preventative control: spray with Yates Natures Way Fungal spray (a mix of Copper and Sulphur that stops further spread).  

And then there are caterpillars (the juvenile stage of butterflies and moths).  

Up North the Fall Armyworm is invading the paddocks and vegetable gardens; in your cabbage patch the larva of white butterfly is having a go. In my tunnel house, the tomato fruitworm and green loopers plus a dash of other cutworms damage all sorts of crops and ornamentals.  

Luckily, we now have a few rather good and safe insecticides that will deal to caterpillars: Yates Success ULTRA is not toxic to beneficial creatures that naturally control caterpillars and other pests. It is also usable on edible crops.  

A new group is Diamide Insecticides such as Chlorantraniliprole. Lawn Grub Control, Turf Insecticides or Leafroller and Codling Moth sprays (Altacor). 

But the most important thing to do NOW is keeping your eyes open in the garden!  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:07):
You're listening to the Saturday Morning with Jack Team podcast
from News Talks at me.

Speaker 2 (00:12):
Yeah, but that's time to catch up with the man
and the garden route climb past is here? What in
a road? Here?

Speaker 3 (00:19):
A check? You started it?

Speaker 4 (00:21):
Passion vine hoppers.

Speaker 3 (00:22):
Do you know what?

Speaker 2 (00:23):
I don't think I've ever seen so many of one
insect in one space as the number of passion vine
hoppers at my place. They are just everywhere. It's a
proper like infestation levels.

Speaker 3 (00:38):
Yeah, but it's not really. It happens from time to time.
Some years are worse than others. But this is it.
But you know, I've got good news and I've got
bad news. The bad news is, of course, you're far
too late to do anything about it.

Speaker 2 (00:49):
Brilliant, Okay, So I've just been that means. But basically
the last three weeks have just been totally total.

Speaker 3 (00:55):
Yeah, exactly. Well, we talked about, you know, when there
were young fluffy bumps to spray straight in with something,
but that's in We're talking about September, October, November, that
sort of time. But anyway, what you can do now
is watch them lay eggs, because they'll start doing that
very soon. And I put some pictures on the on
the website to show you or show everybody what those

(01:17):
eggs look like. They're usually on tendrils of all sorts
of plants. And once you see those, you can cut
those off because you're prune in the winter on autumn anyway,
put them in the fireplace and a way you go,
that's the end of the eggs.

Speaker 2 (01:30):
Okay, yeah, right, So I have been I mean I have.
I've used the fly spray as you suggested. I've also
used knee oil, but that's kind of too late for yeah, okay,
all right, Well here in next few weeks in Yep,
when it comes to my tomato plants, powder and mildew,
I know is always a bit of an issue. So
I managed to have one tomato plant got powder and mildew.

(01:54):
I tried to control it with a bit of a
copper spray and stuff. But the other tomato plant I've
managed to keep clear for the time being. But this
is obviously something that affects a lot of people as well.

Speaker 3 (02:04):
Absolutely, and there's a lot of hosts get powdery mild
you cucumbers, pump can squash your name with outdrangers, beans, grapes, apples,
you name it. The idea is for you.

Speaker 5 (02:14):
To actually keep that spray up every two or three
weeks because copper or copper and sell from mixes are
really good to stop the powdery mild you taking hold
of your plants. And that goes for all the things
I mentioned, And this is probably a good idea to
keep it going.

Speaker 3 (02:32):
And seeing that the copper and the other things are
actually organic, you don't have any worries about plants that
you harvest your food from.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
So use them like that.

Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yeah, and again, now's the time to start looking for
these things on the leaves. And as soon as you
see the little white spots copper and sulfur sprays the
same sort of things nature's way fungles pray from the
age for instance. That'll stop it from literally becoming a
nasty situation later, yeah, later. What about caterpillars, Well, this

(03:08):
is the time for all the caterpillars, as you will know,
we've got you got your full army where I'm all
over the place in the north. You guys have it.
We don't yet in christ it and hopefully won't get it.
Tomato fruit worm and white butterfly for instance, and green loopers,
all those things love your garden, and those caterpillars are omnivores,

(03:30):
they'll eat anything. Here comes to nice thing. We've got
some rather new insecticides that you can use on caterpillars
that are safe to use because you won't, for instance,
kill all the predators and parasites. That also help to
control them.

Speaker 5 (03:45):
The material is Yet's success Ultra right.

Speaker 4 (03:49):
And then there is a diamide insecticide called Chlorontra Nilipro,
lovely word Clorontra and nillipro, and that comes in the
version of Loan Grub Control, in the version of turf Insecticides,
and lif Roller and model what sprays called Alta Core.

(04:09):
All these rotten names will be on the website so
everybody can look that up. But the most important thing
is to look for those things now and make sure
that you get them before they starting everything up.

Speaker 2 (04:22):
Yeah, okay, I am listening to you. I promise you
I've heard that information has gone into my brain because
apparently I'm not been very good at acting in a
timely manner. I know what problems are on the garden now,
I can get that, but the problem is getting to
them at the right stage, which is always going to
be my issue.

Speaker 3 (04:37):
Thank you so much. Road Listen, You've got other things
on your mind and the best things in the world.
Get on with that.

Speaker 2 (04:44):
That's true. That's true. Hey, thank you so much. We
will catch again next week in Real Clive Past and
the Guard.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
For more from Saturday Morning with Jack Tame, Listen live
to news talks that'd be from nine am Saturday, or
follow the podcast on iHeartRadio.