Sammy I was actually thinking the praying mantis. You can get praying mantis egg sacks. Each comes with 200 eggs. And because praying mantises can't fly they stay in your garden. The downside is that I fear they will snatch ladybugs and the bees, but the sad part is that all the bees, even the native ones have been missing since mid-July. The only ladybug I saw was in May. All I get are these nasty flies, thrips and the cucumber beetles visiting. All a sad reminder how important it is to protect our bees from Sevin. Anyway I think a praying mantis would be terrific in my situation. Hopefully the birds won't find the mantis but I think 200 eggs and its camouflage are good odds for it. I am lucky in that my flowers still look very pretty and I only get a few sprinkling of holes in some. But one never knows with insects and fungus, sometimes they just suddenly infest out-of-the-blue. I am sure the praying mantis will be very happy with the thrips and the houseflies that keep visiting my fragrant roses (ugggh, shudder!). Flies are another one of my most hated insects because they're filthy scavengers, which is why I always curb my dog. I hate! flies and that's my ultimate prissiness speaking.

I am still here and puzzled. I do not understand why people have so much trouble with this Canna. We had an unusual summer with temps above 90 for months and I still did not get burns this year. The first year I had some burning. None since. I think it is a gardener's teaching that plants will rot if they grow in as much water as I am growing my Cannas. Admittedly I stumbled on this method out of desperation. I travel often I leave on Mondays and return Fridays. I am not home to water everyday. This schedule can go on for 3 wks. So I started with drainage holes but brought the cheap baby diapers 1.99 at Big lots. Soaked them for an hour and would take the jello stuff out and mixed it with the soil. The pots were still dry when I returned on Friday. That is when I went to no drainage, diapers, and filling the pots with water and 3/4 soil. For those that want and can grow them in the ground all year. I would dig a hole lay a garbage bag in the planting area and go with the diaper, soil, water mixture and water daily. I am not only using the over water process with Stuey, I use it with all my cannas because I cannot water every day. They are beautiful. By the way..I brought this canna from a water garden site. So I suspect that is why it responds to more water than soil treatment. I do not know why the others like it also. Maybe all cannas are water hogs it is just stuttgart shows how unhappy it is by burning leaves. So I guess I am saying either treat it as a water plant or learn to love burned leaves.

What you are seeing is probably fungus gnat larvae. Placing a mosquito dunk in your watering can will get rid of them. I've also heard placing bay leaves in the containers works. Spidermites like sundews and pings so keep them away from where the MG was.

Well, There is good news and bad news... First of all, the good news is that honey bees and hornets are totally of a different nature. Honey bees survive winters by keeping each other warm while not leaving the nest. You can even move them from one place to another. They are beautiful and very beneficial to all plant life including human.... I would love to have these around for many useful purposes. As for your yellow jackets.... They too are beneficail to nature and they will die off if the nest is partialy exposed to those kind of winter temps kimmsr is talking about. BUT, the bad news is that, if their nest is to deep in your foundation, or you have no idea where it is, there could be a problem. They will survive the winter if to deep where they can stay a bit warmer than you expect, yet they will slow down quite drastically, be lethargic, almost asleep. But they WILL survive. The only way you can get rid of them if they are not going to die off, sadly, is by extermination. Now I am not a fan of this or of any kind of mass murder to insects beneficial to our enviroment, but that is the only way to rid them, SADLY. There a powder you can buy that you can place at their entry way, that gets on their fur and wings, which in turn they carry to the nest, rubbing it all over the others. Your local extermination office should have this stuff, or you can hire a professnonal to do it..To bad they have to loose their natural habitat to human developement..:-( Hope this helps....Goodluck.