Beachguy, if your problem is the SVB, I haven't found any organic pesticides that really work. You can play all day with row covers, Bt, aluminum foil, nylons/panty hose, etc, and still lose everything and look foolish in the process. Some methods to conquer the SVB below will be controversial or objectionable to some here, but I did use the word CONQUER, and not BATTLE. The goal is to win, not just fight, and that may be best left to non-organic means. For SVB's, I've found there are really just 3 choices: 1.Spend a couple hours every couple days laying on cardboard or a rug on the ground inches away from the vine inspecting it closely and removing any eggs. Even doing this, you'll still look foolish! 2.Use non-organic products. Most effective are Bug-B-Gon Concentrate with the active ingredient Esfenvalerate; any products with the active ingredient Lambda-cyhalothrin; products with the active ingredient Imidacloprid. 3.Befriend a farmer who uses Scimitar CS or Warrior-T... or try to find some on the internet. You only need about a shot-glass full to last all season. Problem solved. The only other way you may be successful is to use a breathable weedblock fabric below the plant and floating row cover above it... it too can have problems--you must remove the row cover to pollinate by hand, or remove it long enough for bees to pollinate flowers, however this exposes the plant to the adult SVB to lay eggs again; and if the weedblock isn't fastened securely, and you plant in the same spot as previous years, there's still a chance an emerging moth from below can come up thru the hole you cut out for the plant! Hope this helps.

George, who posts here as MacMex, mentions Tatume fairly often as it has grown well for him. Other winter squashes we've discussed recently that show good tolerance to Squash Vine Borers and other pests are Seminole pumpkin (pumpkins are a subset of the winter squash family) is a native from the Florida Everglade area, and Trombocino Rampicante an Italian vining squash that can be used as a summer squash while young and as a winter squash if the squash are left on the vine to mature. Its perferred use is as a summer squash. Both exhibit outstanding resistance to SVBs. Butternut is another winter squash that is very tolerant of SVBs. The 'Tahitian Melon' squash offered at SESE is very similar to butternut but has a longer neck and good tolerance of SVBs. All of the above are usually available from many sellers including Baker Creek Heirloom Seed, Sand Hill Preservation Center and Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. When selecting squash to grow, the ones that are Cucurbita moschata are the ones to choose for resistance to Squash Vine Borers. Other squash (C. pepo, C. agyrosperma and C. mixta) do not have the same tolerance to SVB damage. I rarely plant any winter squash anymore that are not C. moschata. With summer squash, I have better luck growing them under floating row covers to exclude the pests. However, you do have to hand-pollinate the squash because the floating fow covers exclude the pollinators. Or, you can grow them under floating row covers until they begin to bloom, and then remove the row covers for pollination. However, once the row covers are removed, the squash bugs, cucumber beetles and SVBs will attack the plants. I've never had SVB kill or even seriously set back Seminole Pumpkin and because of their very thick rind they will store for up to a year if cured properly and stored properly. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Seminole Pumpkin at SESE

Granny, until recently I was totally organic in the garden. When I would have an infestation of some kind, the organic correction was only marginally successful. I do not know if it was just me or my location or what. I wish these various links would define what they mean when they say "control". I assume they mean that you bring the population down to an acceptable level. To me an acceptable level is one, either male or female but not both. I see my only options right now as being, use BBG or not growing squash for a couple of years. I am so upset over this that I am going to have an IT instead of a BM. Ok so I told one little lie. :o) John Here is a link that might be useful: Johns Journal

I have grown Tatume here a couple of times. While it outcompetes squash bugs, the squash vine borers still can kill it in a year when they are really bad. I don't grow it any more because we liked the flavor/texture of Seminole harvested young (baseball to softball-sized) better than Tatume. It is a huge space hog too, and because I already grow 6-10 kinds of C. moschatas most years, the last thing I need is a space hog that isn't as tasty as they are. Bon, I couldn't help noticing how many of my favorite Texas horticulturalists (Sam Cotner, Malcom Beck, Howard Garrett) were in Howard Garrett's story about Malcom's pumpkin. (Mr. Garrett and Mr. Beck write extensively on organic gardening and all their books are excellent, and Mr. Cotner wrote THE book on growing Vegetables in Texas. I've worn out 3 copies of it and am on my 4th.) Jay White, by the way, writes regularly for Texas Gardener magazine (as does Greg Grant) and their articles and columns are the first ones I read when a new magazine arrives. It is a well-known and well-understood phenomenon that healthy plants grown in healthy soil are more disease tolerant and more pest tolerant than less healthy plants. When pests relentlessly attack plants, I try to figure out what it is about those specific plants that make them less healthy and, therefore, more alluring to pests and to diseases. Sometimes it is obvious to me because the plants under attack are growing in less healthy soil. Sometimes it is something much more subtle---like cool-season plants that are beginning to be subjected to hotter temperatures than they like. Howard Garrett makes a convincing argument for us to grow our brassicas in the fall only in this part of the country because they have less pests since they are less stressed in cooler conditions---and I believe he is right about that. And, there are some pests, like grasshoppers, that relentlessly attack everything still green in the hot summer months, whether the plants are healthy and happy are not. So, for every "rule" that we observe, their is an exception, and I find grasshoppers to be one of the exceptions to the rule that healthy plants in healthy soil are not attacked by pests and diseases. I grew up eating yellow summer squash for as far back as I can remember and nothing I've ever grown as a more pest-tolerant substitute for it is 100% acceptable. When I want yellow squash, I simply want yellow squash---nothing else will do. So, in order to have it, I just grow it in low tunnel rows under row cover and hand-pollinate it. I feel like I don't have to settle for less in my own garden, and growing Tatume instead of the yellow squash I really want is, indeed, settling for less. You'll never know how you feel about Tatume until you grow it yourself. I just wasn't crazy about the flavor and didn't find it to be a really heavy producer either. To be fair to Tatume, it never will look like a heavy producer when it is grown adjacent to Seminole because Seminole outproduces it (and everything else) every single time. There is a reason Seminole is a perennial fave in our garden----it is beaten everything else for about 15 years now, and that track record is hard to break. It has been around forever....I can remember it being on seed racks in Texas when I was a child, although I think then it likely was sold as Calabacita, because that is the name that pops into my head every time I see a packet of the seeds. For squash vine borer tolerance or resistance, as George noted, C. moschatas will win every time and, for me, the C. agyrospermas like White Cushaw, Green-Striped Cushaw and Orange-Striped Cushaw are in second place. Tatume might come in third, or actually, a distant fourth behind every kind of yellow summer squash that exists when grown under row cover. YMMV. You can grow any squash or pumpkin you want if only you'll grow them under summerweight row cover, tulle netting, mosquito netting, etc. and hand-pollinate. Does it take longer and a bit more effort? Sure it does, but it is worth it to avoid the heartbreak of losing plants to the dastardly SVBs. Dawn