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gixxerific
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Pill bug invasion

I know that or at least think that pill bugs (rolly poly's) are normally composters. But they have been eating my fruit as well. I have thousands, no millions maybe billions of these these things in my garden, really. They are thick and everywhere. Every cateloupe I pick up I have to brush them off, sometimes they are on my tomatoes if low to the ground. I harvested Sweet potatoes today and there were tons of them in the root mass.

This isn't the first year of this either. I remember them in at least my sweet potatoes last year, some of them even came out brown I though it was from the pill bug damage. But this year my sweets all look good, same stock but even more PB's.

Is there a reason I have so many, a soil problem or something? Is there a way to get rid of them or at least control them? Seriously they are all over the place. I do use grass and hay and veggie matter as a mulch, this is probably to their liking but they are damaging my fruit and that is not to my liking.

Thanks

Dono

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applestar
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Quick search reveals that pill bugs are a member of the Crustacea. Hmmm Crustacea, eh? I recommend eating more shrimp, crabs, and crawfish, and putting the remains in the compost pile to boost your garden's chitin-eating bacteria population. 8) :wink:

Look into encouraging other natural predators, too.

Also, instead of just brushing them off, have soapy bucket ready and send them swimming, or just put them in a dry bucket and bag them or something until desiccated and dead, THEN put them back in the compost pile.

Oh hey neat! I just found out something new :D
I've been seeing a lot of these spiders lately, and look what they are called and what they eat! 8)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Woodlouse_spider

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rainbowgardener
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As far as what might be encouraging them, they need a really moist environment. So maybe along with having a really rich organic soil as I'm sure you do, maybe you are keeping it a little more moist under the mulch than it needs to be?

A lot of the same control methods that work against slugs, work against pillbugs: diatomaceous earth, beer traps, putting a board flat on the soil and then flipping it up in the daytime (they are likely to be congregated on the under side of it).

Here's a little article about controlling them: https://www.ehow.com/how_7764298_organic-pest-control-pill-bugs.html

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applestar
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There ya go, Gixx. You need more seafood and citrus in your diet. You heard it here. :lol:

Want me to mail you some of those spiders in a little box? :>

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gixxerific
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Thanks you gals Rock. I'm sure I could have found that info but I like to hear peoples experiances.

Apple putting them in a soapy bucket wuld be futile. Like I said there are millions in here everywhere you look. when you find one there is usualy a carpet of them. :cry: Put a few of them spiders in a envelope and send 'em my way. :P

I would love to eat more seafood but my wife doesn't like it and thinks it is too espensive to boot. I will have to talk to her. And speaking of beer traps RBG I had a few cans that fell behind a cage and I couldn't get them. I just got to them and it was full of rainwater when I dumped it out it was full of them as well as it stinking to high heaven. :shock:

And yes my rich soil though drains well also stays moist for a long time. Probably not a good thing to keep these under control but a great thing for the veggies. Kind of a catch 22 there, what do you do?

Again thanks you two. I will check out that link RBG, I have some DE here so maybe I will try that and see what happens.

ACW
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Your wild birds are different species to the ones we have in the UK so cant really help My local robins are very keen on woodlice as we tend to call pillbugs so you could try to encourage a few birds with nest boxes and feeding /water stations .

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gixxerific
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I have a feeder in the willow tree right at teh bas of my garden. My nieghbor has to small goldfich ponds tso they have water. I also have nest up. We do have robins as well as many other birds here.

Tonio
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so Dono, hows it coming with them pillbugs?

With DE, I usually hit em everyother day to keep em at bay from munching the seedlings and still lose about 20%. Finally got 1 bed cleared of them.

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gixxerific
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Raining like mad right now and with winter coming I would assume it is pointless. I have never lost seedling to them, they just tear up my fruit.

My firewood pile next to my garden probably isnt' helping.



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