Take some dishwashing liquid soap. I put a couple of good squirts in a glass with some water and mix. Then get an eye dropper and put a drop or two on each egg cluster. Will also effectivle kill the adults if drop on them and trhey can usually be found at the base of the plant. Insects breath through the skin and the soap coats the eggs or adults when applied directly on then and suffocates them. The eggs don't hatch and you can watch the adults die a painful death in a couple of minutes of pleasurful entertainment. It does however cause a burn spot on the leaves but is no more harmful to the plant than squishing and much easier.The cardboard or other board material placed near the base of the plant is very effective in providing cover for the bugs and makes it easy to find them. It is also not a good idea to mulch squash because this gives them places to hide. Rodger

If the vast majority of the material you put into your compost is well digested, not recognizable as what it was, and the material smells like good, rich earth it is ready to use. If there are pieces of woody material the can be screened out, picked out, or simply put onto the soil with the rest of the compost depending on how much work you want to do. A compost pile that is a host to a lot of flies is too wet.

If they are doing no harm to the plant why would you need to do anything at all? Maybe these wee buggers are actually controlling some insect that you really do not want on your plants and knocking them off with a sharp water spray or killing them with anything may be the worst thing you could do. Of the some 8,000,000 identified insects in the world today we know that about 8,000 are, potentially, harmful while the others either help control those that might be pests or pollinate our crops, or do no harm. As always simply seeing some insect in your garden is not a reason to get any bug killer out.

No problem- glad to help. I just re-read in Rodale's 'Organic Garden Basics', that if you have a sick plant and ask someone whatâÂÂs wrong with it- the first thing they do is grab a leaf to look at it. Then they walk around your garden spreading whatever is wrong with the sick plant to the rest of your garden. Remember- separate totes=separate tools. This would especially apply to a âÂÂknownâ sick worm bin. âÂÂNuff Said. Mites only indicate a wet bin and are not a problem so forget about them. They are part of the soil web that breaks down material into compost. They are âÂÂgood guysâ and every RM tote I have ever seen has them so donâÂÂt beat yourself up over them. Any other bug you see is a âÂÂgood guyâ with a job to do. Except those centipedes- they eat worms, which adds nitrogen to the soil which is a good thing, but we are raising worms and donâÂÂt want them in the box. Kill all centipedes, and frogs (toss them) and garter snakes (toss them, too). These have a job but they eat worms, so we donâÂÂt like them around. Add bedding- this will starve other critters but not the worms. Worms can live on just paper. Remember worms have survived for a long time on leaf litter (paper) and manure (the dead bodies of all the bugs). Wurmz iz e-z!