when bees are gathering nectar or pollen, they seem to be pretty focused on the task at hand and not bothered much by other insects or people for that matter

Thanks for the link. I haven't seen any grubs while turning the soil since I went with milky spore. I bet that they would do a great job too.

I've used a handheld vac on my raspberries. I don't know why they don't fly away at the sound of the vacuum but they don't. It worked really well. It might work on blackberries too but those are thornier so I'm not sure you can get to the beetles without the thorns grabbing you. I'm going to put up bags again. I sent literally gallons of beetles to the landfill last summer. I was able to put the bags up a few hundred feet from the house to attract them away from the yard. I'm sure I must've cleared the whole neighborhood, there were soooo many. I'm hoping to get the bags up early enough before the beetles start laying eggs for next year, which is in the first week from the time they emerge from what I've read. I'd like to figure out a way to funnel them into a five gallon bucket below the trap because the bags were too full and hard to unzip at the bottom - too gross to describe. I'll spare you. I tried funneling them into a trash bag but something tore into the bag since it was down on the ground, skunk or possum maybe. I hope whatever it was ate them all before they escaped. I don't see how nematodes could possibly make a dent unless you did all your neighbors' yards too, so I think it's good that you're not spending a lot of money on that Teeandcee.

Ooooh, Ann - I love the idea of something other than me zeroing in on these nasty little critters. I don't recognize assassin bugs but as I recall they look rather like small skinny wasps? I have a bug-friendly yard with a lot of companion plants and no-spray, so hopefully I can attract the assassins to stay. This is only our third year with more than a scattering of JBs so it may be that the food supply has to be enough for the assassins to stay. Heck, I'll set up my son's old xBox and let them play Assassins Creed all night if they'll just hang around and suck the life out of the JBs. Thanks for your alternative speculations, folks - they made me smile. I rather wondered if this might be an excess of passions and I looked for tiny cigarettes in the same bloom (smile) but that's one vice that JBs sadly haven't taken up yet. Too bad - JB lung cancer might be an alternative to the assassin bugs. Sunny, if they were playing possum to avoid getting squished it was a definitely unsuccessful ploy. instead they stayed put long enough to make sure they got squished as a precaution on my part. The only good JB is a flat JB - I've even seen them moving about after I snip an end or two off with the pruners, so I don't mess about with JB death. I'm sure drowning works as well but it takes planning ahead to tote around the water and I'm more of a spontaneous murderer. If the JB police ever catch me, I'm sure I can get the charges dropped to manslaughter (or in this case bugslaughter) since they have no evidence other than this post that the killing was premeditated. And you folks would NEVER rat on me, right? Cynthia