Summer_Squash, it appears to only be the old leaves. The further down the vine I go, the better the leaves look. I just checked. Some of the decaying leaves do also have yellow spots on them. And I found two very small but already dead/yellow fruits. This post was edited by wstoutamire on Wed, Jun 25, 14 at 13:41

This is my first year growing pumpkins. Grew squash last year. I had a very large infestation of the darned things this year and did hours of research. I have a bee hive a few yards from my 1/4 acre patch so I will not use any insecticides etc. Although as with any method, this is time consuming but very effective in killing both the nymphs AND adults. Get yourself some "Castile" soap. Kirk's makes it and Dr. Bronner's & probably others. It is an old fashioned hand (bar) soap. I found Kirk's @ my local grocery store. Usually not found in Wal-marts etc. Shave or grate about 1/3rd of the bar into 32 oz. of hot/very warm water and let it dissolve. Put it in a spray bottle, set it half way between stream and spray (this gives it just a bit of foam with the spray) and spray those buggers. The little ones die on contact and the adults may move a few inches to a foot before they keel over. This soap works because the "castile" means it was made with natural (olive, coconut, vegetable etc.) oil. It causes them to suffocate. This has worked awesome for me. I go out in the evening when the bees are done and avoid spraying the flowers. Have to pick up and look under the leaves and you can get several at once if they are clustered. I seem to find them most often under the leaves that are already dying around the edges. As for the eggs, I got tired of cutting and bagging so I just use a grill lighter and burn them til they are obviously useless. If you have a hard time finding the soap you can get it on line but check the grocery store first. Kirk's Castille Soap comes in a white paper wrapper with blue and red printing and I buy mine for $1.99 for a 3 pack.

This siberian iris is on a friend's wish list. The friend recently had radiation and chemo so I would like to surprise her. I have many choice plants to trade including Iris foetidissima var. citrina, saffron crocus, some named historic iris, snowdrops,etc.

For the last few days we have seen squash bugs on our bush zucchini. I have been trying (not very successfully) to remove the eggs, and the bugs were sent into a soapy water bath. The bush zucchini is in a container on the deck, all by itself. But in the main garden (40-ish feet away) we have a whole row of various squash and cucumbers. My question is this: should I leave the squash bugs alone on the bush zucchini and use it as a trap crop? I don't mind sacrificing that one plant to save the whole row. We have not seen any squash bugs in the row at all. Or should I put row cover over the bush zuc and just trap the bugs in there? There was a baby praying mantis eating the little bugs yesterday but there are way too many for it to eat them all. Also, if the bugs stay in the potting soil, does that mean that I should not reuse the soil the bush zuc is in next year? Thanks in advance for any advice.