jrslick, I would feel guilty killing the ants... will if I have to but I will wait it out and see if I can find another way... I am Muslim and we aren't supposed to kill ants. We can if they become a nuisance though... I will try to spend time watching the ladybugs and see if the ants are attacking them..... glib, I hope that female ladybug lays her eggs on my plants! I juts looked up the lifecycle of ladybugs and I had no idea they have a larvae, then pupa stage before emerging as adult ladybugs... I wonder what that bug is in my third photo... I wonder if they hibernate here? Maybe during the worst of the summer temperatures? jean001a, thank you, though for a "garden" it really is just veggie plants in containers up on our concrete roof. I never knew about the syrphid/flower fly before! It makes me excited to know I at least have some beneficial bugs starting to visit up on my roof garden :) I am going to leave my plants alone for a few days and hope more beneficial bugs come and can eat up the aphids.

This does not sound like herbicide drift. If it was pesticides they were using then I don't know. You would have to find out what they were using to see if it could cause this. As far as your upkeep of your roses it sounds like you have been doing the same thing all along and it probably did not cause this. If it is herbicides they were using your roses will look like rose rosette disease. Good luck. Patrick

I have not used soap spray on Japanese beetles. Fortunatly they are not a big problem for me in the vegetable garden. However, they have ruined my roses, but with the roses Japanese beetles are a short term problem and the plants bounce back. I have seen beans reuined due to them. The now retired Dr. Bradshaw from Clemson University ran the heirloom vegetable garden at the State Botantical gardens. This garden is certified organic and he uses a soap spray applied in the heat of the day to the top of the beans directly on the beetles. The soap only kills beetles that it comes in contact with and provides no residual kill. As an added benifit he found during the time the soap was sprayed no deer tracks were found around the garden, so, they began a routine spray around the perimeter to deter deer. He uses Dawn but stated any brand of dishwashing soap could be used and dishwashing soap was much cheaper and maybe more effective than insecticidal soaps. The reason for spraying in the heat of the day is that during this time is when the beetles are feeding. In the evening and early morning the beetles are flying around looking for new areas and mates.The beetles also don't fly during wet weather. The soap will only kill the beetles it comes in contact with. He also did some experimenting and found some amazing results to deter the beetles. He used beetles caught in a trap pureed them in a blender strained the mixture to get rid of the soilds used this beetle juice puree to mix the soap with and sprayed the beetles feeding on the beans. The soap quickly killed the adults by suffocation and the bug juice work as a repellant to keep the newly arriving beetles away. I don't remember the soap to water ratio he used but I have used soap on squash bugs and I used about a 1/2 cup in a gallon of water in one of those hand pump sprayers. I found that the soap did burn the leaves on the squash so I used an eye dropper to target the soap on egg clusters and used the spray at the base of the plant, which didn't burn it,in the early morning or late evening or best after a rain when the squash bugs are active. It was very effective in killing the bugs but they have to be drenched in the liquid and it was easy to do with the wand of the sprayer. I made it a weekly routine to spraw around the base of all the vines especially at the root base and had my best a prettiest crop of heirloom pumpkins and winter squash ever last year. All insects breath through the skin and the soap clogs the pores suffocating the bugs. Mr Bradshaw never reported any burning of the leaves on the beans and it could be my concentration was too high. So try a test spot and only spray on the clusters of beetles and not the whole bean vine and see how it does. The only thing to lose is possible a few beetles. Rodger

PIM, I was NOT trying to be rude, but I can be if you want me to. All I was trying to get across was that using the soap concoction CONTROLS the nematodes, you never completely eliminate them. In our gardening endeavours we all run a fine line between what we will and will not accept in terms of controlling pests. If you are prepared to live with control, that's your choice. If I want to eliminate and have to resort to using the heavy guns, that's my choice. In my personal situation with nematodes I am very fortunate in that I have never had nematodes in any plants planted in the ground, they only ever showed up in potted up plants. And with the micro environment in pots I am not concerned about the impact on the growing medium because the volume is so small. I'd have to do a major rethink of the process however if I were ever to find it in the garden beds. We are all up in arms over HVX, and rightly so, but once discovered in your garden there is only one way to deal with: remove and destroy the infected plant. And that's pretty much the end of it since the virus cannot live for long outside the roots and crown. It's different with foliar nematodes and I venture that foliar nematodes are much more of a scourge than HVX since it would appear as if for most it is a matter of controlling them, rather than completely eradicating them. And not just because of what is used, but because of how the worms survive and migrate within the soil. Plus foliar nematodes affect more than just Hostas by the sounds of it. Everyone's circumstance and perspective is different. If you felt offended by what I said, none was meant, I simply wanted to engage in an exchange of information and make sure all understood that 90%, while a great result, is not elimination of the problem. It is control only. And many would be very happy with that. Just not me, not in my circumstance with a very small, no, a minute, controlled environment. And I don't wish to engage in a discussion of what I'd do if I were to find them in the garden beds, I prefer to cross bridges when I get there. Pieter