My beautiful azaleas
I'm not much of a gardener. Plants in my care tend to die. I overwater, or forget to water, or don't give them enough light. Outdoor plants are overtaken by weeds.
In the Spring of 2003, I was delighted to discover that the evergreen shrubs in front of my house were actually azaleas. They produced beautiful coral pink flowers. It was a short-lived display, but a lovely one. And I didn't have to do anything...they just bloomed! I noticed that they got a bit scraggly at the end of the summer, but they sent out vigorous new stalks in the fall and had lovely blooms again in the spring this year.
I was chagrined to notice, after pruning them down to a nice size a couple of months ago, that they were looking a bit shaggy again. I was out looking at them yesterday, trying to figure out how to extract a thorny vine that had grown into one of them, when I observed one of these:
I looked more closely. No, there wasn't one. There were dozens!
Google is my friend. I typed "azalea caterpillar" and discovered the creature's common name: the azalea caterpillar. Datana major is found primarily in the southeast, as far north as Maryland and as far west as Louisiana. The young larvae skeletonize the leaves and the mature caterpillars eat the whole leaf. According to the fine folks at North Carolina State University, it is harmless to humans, and can be removed by hand. Clemson University elaborates, and suggests that they be disposed of in soapy water.
DH picked about a hundred off my azaleas this morning. The Hampton Roads Gardening web site says that they rarely kill the plant, but only slow growth, and that early treatment with Sevin in June can control the caterpillar before it damages the plant.
Here is a link to a number of images of the caterpillar, including a couple of them feeding. Yes, there were that many of them.
In the Spring of 2003, I was delighted to discover that the evergreen shrubs in front of my house were actually azaleas. They produced beautiful coral pink flowers. It was a short-lived display, but a lovely one. And I didn't have to do anything...they just bloomed! I noticed that they got a bit scraggly at the end of the summer, but they sent out vigorous new stalks in the fall and had lovely blooms again in the spring this year.
I was chagrined to notice, after pruning them down to a nice size a couple of months ago, that they were looking a bit shaggy again. I was out looking at them yesterday, trying to figure out how to extract a thorny vine that had grown into one of them, when I observed one of these:
I looked more closely. No, there wasn't one. There were dozens!
Google is my friend. I typed "azalea caterpillar" and discovered the creature's common name: the azalea caterpillar. Datana major is found primarily in the southeast, as far north as Maryland and as far west as Louisiana. The young larvae skeletonize the leaves and the mature caterpillars eat the whole leaf. According to the fine folks at North Carolina State University, it is harmless to humans, and can be removed by hand. Clemson University elaborates, and suggests that they be disposed of in soapy water.
DH picked about a hundred off my azaleas this morning. The Hampton Roads Gardening web site says that they rarely kill the plant, but only slow growth, and that early treatment with Sevin in June can control the caterpillar before it damages the plant.
Here is a link to a number of images of the caterpillar, including a couple of them feeding. Yes, there were that many of them.
7 Comments:
Oooooooooooo! (sounds of being impressed) You put a picture in your blog. I like it. I like how your husband hand-picked the caterpillars instead of sprayed them with nerve-damaging chemical agents. He's cool :)
That was me, -- Brenda
Yes, I liked that he hand picked them, too. But next year, in June, I'm going to use nerve-damaging chemical agents.
There is a new program called "Hello" that you can use to upload photos for use in your blog, if you don't already have them. All I did for this was use the "img" html tag. And I didn't even use my own brain, but the "help" feature on blogger, to figure it out.
Nice to know you're still reading, B.
They are actually beautiful bugs, and if they weren't eating my azaleas, I wouldn't have messed with them. But they were eating my azaleas, so they had to die.
Use BT (Bacillus Therengensus). It comes in a small liquid container that you dilute and spray on the plant. It's a bacteria that affect caterpillars but is not poisonous and does not bother other things, such as bees, dogs and people. It works well on tomatoes, edibles, roses and most plants.
VegasJoe, do I use the Bacillus Theregensus (or whatever it's called) when the caterpillars would be in the early larval stage, or do I treat the plant before the eggs would hatch, or when?
Thanks for the info; sounds much better than Sevin.
Salt has no effect on them? :)
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