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Caterpillar Damage On Geraniums
(Pelargonium hortorum)
Yes, you know it's summertime when there are caterpillars on the geraniums. :)
Below are two scans of caterpillars having lunch on my plants. These particular caterpillars were mostly on the blossoms or in one case, were in between the leaf axil and stem. All the plants affected were in the front yard.
The arrows point to the two caterpillars in this scan. One is greyish-brown and one is green. The green type are especially difficult to spot, and as you can see, they will wrap right around a bud.
In this scan, they are more clearly defined. The lower right shows a great example of the holes they leave behind. In addition, sometimes the bud stalk completely collapses.
So, what to do about these little guys?
The best method of control is hand removal. Most methods of chemical spraying will affect the blossoms as well as the caterpillars. Spraying your plants with a hard force of plain water will sometimes dislodge them, but it probably won't remove all of them.
Another option is to use "Nana's Bug Juice", a garlic and pepper spray that I found in a great book. Click here for the recipe. I use this spray to keep whiteflies at bay, to deter most chewing pests, and even to keep the raccoons out of the garbage cans. Well, most of them- one raccoon will open his mouth and catch the spray if I spray it at him. There's a cayenne lover in every crowd. :) I usually spray the garbage cans themselves on the outside.
When not spraying cans or raccoons, I use it on all my plants, making sure I spray the underside of leaves, the blossom stalks, and the main stems, as well as the upper, exposed surfaces.
I had mentioned all of the affected plants were in the front yard. I am sure there are caterpillars in the back and side yards, but two things are different in those areas. I encourage birds to be in the yard by providing water (most important) and seed. They also love to snack on caterpillars.
Another difference that may or may not have affected this was that the front yard has been regularly sprayed for insects and weeds for about nine years. I don't like this, but can't really change it. I think some bugs have started to build up a resistance to the often-used chemicals. I am not sure whether the separation between the front and back yards is a great enough distance to make this true, but I have never sprayed in the back areas. It's just a theory, but it is one factor that may contribute to the abundance of pests in the front yard.
The back yard is all-organic, no pesticides, herbicides, whatever-i-cides. Oh, wait, I do sometimes use a fungicide but haven't needed to very often. None of the blooms or plants seem to be affected by an abundance of insects and I have many different types of plants in bloom right now. I did see some aphids on a young rose bush, but when I went later to check them, I also saw four lady-beetles, so left it alone. The aphid population was low enough that I knew the lady-beetles would take care of it. If I had used a chemical on the bush, I would have killed the lady beetles right along with the aphids.
I have now hand removed all the caterpillars. I will wash off with a hose, re-locate, and spray the geraniums with the garlic-pepper spray. I did remove some buds and blossoms, when the little guys were wedged in between buds. My plants are potted. If checking plants that are in bedding areas, everything stays the same as far as how to treat them, except you are bending or kneeling a bit more, and relocating the plants isn't an option. Re-locating is not really needed , but the removal of the caterpillars is.
If I had kept up on my preventative spraying with the garlic and pepper spray, I may have avoided the caterpillars. As it was, on 30 potted geraniums, I found seven caterpillars. Even though that's an "abundance" compared to the back yard, that's not too bad.
Back to the garden!