AnnaJW

:06:
Has anyone had problems with Grasshoppers chewing banana leaves? This year we are having more Grasshopper damage on ALL vegetation for some reason... I've never had them bother my banana's...

I try to be Green as much as possible, but the Grasshoppers, ants, and Black and Brown Widows are pushing me towards an area I don't want to use...

__________________
-Anna Banana -

Living my life in MMORPG's

momoese

I hear you Anna. I actually go on little hunting trips around my yard looking for the Grasshoppers. I use the hose and just spray lightly then look to see them fly. Then I use leather tig welding gloves to grab them and squish em!

The ants are totally out of control. We are having trouble feeding our outdoor cat before those suckers cover the food.

Spiders.....I have more spiders around here then anywhere I've ever lived. I am seriously contemplating some sort of spray to help control those bastards. I know they are beneficial but I kid you not, we have them on everything! I get bites just about every time I work in the garden. All of my plants have webs covering them, they are in my garage, in the house, everywhere! I use the vacuum in the house and suck them up then empty the thing in the trash can outside.

mikevan

Here in Texas with the drought, our Apache sized grasshoppers have been a bit troublesome. They've totally defoliated my grapes - tho they're happily coming back, thankfully. They even nibbled on my plumeria! Gingers also get nibbled. My taro has been pretty much untouched, interestingly - I have a lot of taro and it's so rich, green and lush compared to the dry brown foliage around, I'm surprised. Nanners have been chewed on some, but nothing serious. My cacao gets some chewing on the tender new leaves. Sugarcane has some nibbling, tho my pineapples have avoided any damage so far, as well as lemongrass. Since I work out of the home, I'm out there every day, tho, spraying jets of water at my plants to dislodge aphids and in the process grasshoppers too. So far so good. Fire-ants are a problem here, but so long as I keep spraying off the aphids from the taro the fire-ant numbers there are vastly reduced - they farm aphids. No aphids, no food, no food and they move elsewhere. I've seen a few spiders here - not nearly enough. The dry spell has had everything subdued significantly.

Our black widows are fairly common, but well controled by the mud-daubers we have here. When we have mud, that is. Brown recluses are almost never seen here. The rest are no problem whatsoever, so long as you watch where you reach. So, usually I see the regular garden spiders, wolf spiders, crab spiders, the ubiquitous jumping spiders, etc - a fairly tame lot that hasn't given me any trouble at all.

Healthy plants are less likely to be molested - but in times of drought, anything is game. Best thing to do is be vigilent, tolerate some damage and hope the drought doesn't last. There's an organic bait you can put down in early Spring that will kill off the young hoppers - but grasshoppers are highly mobile critters. Chickens, guinea fowl, peacocks will all eat grasshoppers. As will cats and dogs and wild critters. Young snakes will eat grasshoppers too. Make the place bird friendly - errect lotsa bird-houses and feeders. That will help enormously! If you have an abundance of grasshoppers, you have a shortage of predators - I'd seek to find out why and see if it's something you can fix. And, if you have a lot of spiders, then you've got a lot of food for them - be happy they're there - if they weren't you'd be up to your neck with pests! Wear gloves and keep an eye out where you stick your hands if that helps.

Have fun,
Mike

momoese

I forgot about this very special day! I used to grow a lot of Roses and the Grasshoppers would come and eat the flower buds right before they opened. Really bummed me out. Then I bought the big Praying Mantis egg that contains hundreds of the little guys and tied it to plant in the shade. They grew up nicely and kept control of the bad insects for the most part. Then one day I was in the garden and saw something move. I went over to find this huge Mantis about 4-5 inches long that had just grabbed a big Grasshopper and was eating it head first. I ran inside, got my camera and took about a hundred pictures until it was all gone. Certainly one the happiest days in my garden!

I guess I need to get some for this garden now also!

mikevan

Poor mantid. Durned paparazzi never leaves them alone. It's got that "Do you mind?" look about it. We have an abundance of those here too - very happy about that. Tho - their claws can draw blood. Ouch! I'll find twigs with egg cases on them and move them closer to my tropicals. Not to mention a huge garden-spider egg-sack once - that was cool and my cacao had lotsa spiders for a while. Hmmm, it's getting time for more egg cases to start showing up - October usually, sometimes November...

Be well,
Mike

MediaHound

Mike, dig this. My dog likes to run around the yard with leaves that I've trimmed from the plants. Two weeks ago, I was cutting back some overgrown Taro, and Akiva, my dog, picked up a frond to play with. She immediately dropped it back to the ground as soon as she picked it up with her mouth, and shook her head like "yuk". Wondering why, I picked it up and bit into it. It tasted quite bitter, but I thought nothing of it, threw it in the trash can so the dog stayed away from it. Well, you know the tingly feeling you get when you lick a 9-volt battery? No more than ten minutes later (it took a few minutes for anything to happen), my mouth and lips started feeling like they were being electrocuted like that. WHOA! I grabbed the dog, ran inside, and treated both of us.
So it's no wonder why they leave your Taro alone. It's probably poisonous.

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mikevan

Oh, please don't chew on raw taro! Ouch ouch ouch! Ever heard of Dieffenbachia? It's called dumb cane for the same reason - and it's related to taro. What you experienced was the sharp points of millions of microscopic crystals of oxalic acid digging into the tender tissue in your mouth and lips. Be glad you didn't take a big bite - the pain would have lasted for some time. It's not inedible as in poisonous toxic, but it's extremely effective at making life miserable for you for a few hours. And it's a very effective defense - raw tropical yams have the same properties. Deer love to browse on my exotics - they even ate some of my vanilla which has a very caustic sap - but I've only lost 4 small taro leaves to deer and that was that - no more taro nibbled on even tho now my leaves are huge and so lush and inviting and the drough has turned everything else brown! I love the stuff. I grow a little over 30 varieties of edible taro - Taro and Ti is mine - and every single one of them and all parts of them must be well cooked prior to eating. Even the edible Xanthosoma's too. And edible taro is a minority in the complete world of taro - most cannot be made edible - chances are all those sold as ornamentals cannot. But - those that are edible (after cooking) - taro is incredibly nutritious, hypoallergenic and durned tasty. Well, poi has been compared to Elmer's glue, but poi was intended to be consumed with salt-cured fish and pork!

A hui hou,
Mike

Zac in NC

Yep. What Mike said. All Aroids have these wonderful cells called raphids, which hold the oxalic acid crystals until the cell walls are damaged, which makes the raphids shoot out the crystals into your cell membranes, like a blow dart. Some taro cultivars have been bred to have fewer of them.

Zac

MediaHound

haha! oops! guess that makes me a dumbass
It was a feeling like I've never experienced.
This was the culprit:

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JoeReal

One of the most common methods of breaking down the nasty crystals in Taro leaves is to air dry them. Then rehydrate and cook.

Some species would still have other poisonous substances no matter what kind of kitchen processing used.

Zac in NC

Nice Alocasia. It beats my little foot tall one that I wintered over in-ground here. This winter, I am digging mine up. This is hardy yes, but its a bit rediculous with what it could have been.

Zac

mikevan

Er, dumb as in not being able to talk. Tempted to feed it to my wife once and a while.

Those look like alocasias to me. Not many, if any, of those are edible - very high in oxalic acid. Most edibles come from colocasias, and some from xanthosomas. But don't fret - your life was never really in danger - just a great deal of discomfort. If you'd taken a big bite, your mouth would have swollen up and breathing may have been laborous thru a swollen throat, but that's about the worst of it. Unless you rub it in your eyes, or run out of TP in a jungle full of taro - you'd be cross-eyed and walking funny for a while.

Be well,
Mike

MediaHound

Thanks, Zac!
It's been pupping like nuts. I'm starting to line the sidewalk with them,

and I've got a few more rooting in containers ATM.
Funny thing is, I don't even know where it came from! It just sprung up from the ground! A seed must have made its way into the yard from some other plants, dirt, mulch, etc..

Anna, one good way to throw your yard's ecosystem out of whack is by getting a mosquito magnet. I love mine!

(those are orchids growing in the mulch, they came with it )

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mikevan

Steaming or boiling is the traditional Hawaiian method - when it's the consistancy of boiled spinach, you're good. A friend of mine cans his in salt water - kinda like cabbage. I don't have a canner... yet - but have an abundance of edible lu'au leaves. I've never heard of the drying method - where does that come from?

Be well,
Mike

momoese

Jarred, how long does a tank last and how long does the attractant last? Also any problems with the unit and how effective have you found it be? We have a serious mosquito problem this year.

JoeReal

Boiling is another way, but I find the air drying much better. In fact any type of drying will do, but if exposed to the sun, the leaves turns brown.

Where does the method come from? Been doing that in the Philippines for thousands of years perhaps. But popular in the Bicol region of the Philippines. It was explained well to us in our Horti class in college, some 25 years ago.

MediaHound

The tank lasts about three or four weeks. The attractant that I use isn't the octenol that you would use, so ymmv. I use a different attractant for this part of the country. My attractant gets replaced every two months or so. As in if I get bit and it's been a while since I changed it.
http://www.mosquitomagnet.com/how_it_works/attractants/
I use Lurex³
There are also replacement nets that need to be changed out every few months, the fibers break down.
I've never had a problem with the fan, it just hums along...

No problems whatsoever. It's entirely effective. I brought it in for this last storm we just had, Ernesto. I didn't take it back out for a few days after the storm, and I got bit. I never get bit when its running. To me, that's worth what I paid for it, and then some, ya know..


Go for it, Mitchel, you won't be disappointed!
I wish everyone had these. I wish the city installed some sort of system like this on every lightpost. It's brilliant!

Even though it needs maintenence - check/change tank, nets, attractant, wheel it in / out for hurricanes, reset the switch if it cuts off for whatever reason- I don't mind. That's the price I pay for me, my girlfriend, and my dog (and my lucky neighbors) to stay bite-free.

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Zac in NC

Is the house next to you available??? Skeeters are awful here.

Zac

mikevan

That's really neat! I've got some Philipino Shortstem Dasheen out there somewhere too - I'll have to give it a try. Of course, if it doesn't work (I do it wrong), you'll know by me mumbling something completely intelligible to you. Leaf production for taro is about at its peak now here - it'll start to decline pretty soon as the corms start to develop. Can you say "Taro Chips"? Drool!!!!! Cubed taro - kakakura ula ula is about peaked out and putting out keiki! Here pretty soon. My Pi'iali'i is already declined - full corms ready for poi. Here before long I'll dig a proper imu and have a bona fide luau! Wonder how I look in a grass skirt!

Mahalo,
Mike

mikevan

A fairly maintenance free alternative is to errect several bat-houses. Then, they eat your skeeters and moths (that produce caterpillars that eat on your nanners, lotus and veggies) and give you fertilizer all at once. And you never see or really hear them unless you're looking for them.

Be well,
Mike