I found some new eggs over the weekend. I'm in the Lehigh Valley of PA. They couldn't have been there more than a few days. So far this summer I've cut about 8 of the borers out of my 6 kabocha squashes, and got a few out of one zucchini. So far the plants seem to be recovering. Originally I thought it was bacterial wilt, since I've had a bunch of striped cuke beetles. For some reason I thought the borer-related wilt would be much more sudden and complete. (Needless to say, I'm new at SVB problems.) But now I'm getting better at finding the borers -- that seems to be key: knowing exactly what to look for. Originally I was expecting to find lots of frass coming out of the base of the plant. But if the borer enters along a leaf stem, there can be virtually no frass, since the leaf stems are hollow. But I've noticed that you can spot the holes on leaf stems much of the time, and then can catch the bugger in there. Exhausting. I'm going to have to get some needles and Bt to have on hand. I've never tried that.

I still see no difference. I'm spraying the roses on the chance that mildew spores will land on it and infect the plant. The spray has a longer effective time than BT, obviously, but it's limited too, that's why I have to spray every 1-2 weeks (and failing to, I get mildew infestation like I did last year and beginning of this year when I got negligent about it). Since at this point I'm positive my plants WILL get SVB. No matter how hard I search for eggs, I'm going to wind up with them. It's not a matter of if, but when, then at some point my weekly injection will overlap a point of time when they're too small for me to see obvious signs of them, but already inside eating, and kill them before they do too much harm. I got to them with injections this year before they did enough damage to kill the plants, but they still did enough damage to hurt production and weaken the plants. Taking a preventative approach, I may be able to kill them before my plants are weakened. You do a series of injections up the entire vine, and the amount you inject is actually pretty low to fill the cavity in the vine. I only mix a cup full and after injecting six plants, I still have some left over that I usually spray onto my broccoli. This post was edited by CaraRose on Fri, Sep 6, 13 at 12:18

gardenall, For slugs, try a iron phosphate product around the plants you want to protect. This is sometimes called "Sluggo" or "Escar-go". (Another option I've read about, but never tried is DUCKS. Ducks according to what I've read, love to eat slugs, and won't scratch like chickens.) I used it early this season (while my lettuce was very small) and had very good success, fewer slugs by far than in previous years. I also have a large bird population, that enjoys being in my garden. (I chase them off before my seeds come up, but let them hang out after that to help control the slug/insect population.)

It will be a good experiment to see how the squash and shallots work together. My zucchini is taking off but it has space for its travels. One pumpkin vine has left the garden and is continuing down the alley behind the house. The vines have at least 15 pumpkins, not including the tiny ones. I plant pumpkins for fun and the enjoyment of local walkers. I want kids to know that pumpkins don't come from the grocery store. Last year the vine grew up through a hedge and there was a pumpkin on top of the hedge. I harvested the pumpkins in July 2014 because the vine was an unsightly mess. One pumpkin was placed on an upside down pot in the garden. It has lasted 10 months and had to be chopped up this morning (a critter was starting to eat it). No wonder the pilgrims liked them, right? Hope you don't mind my rambling. No one else here shares my enthusiasm for pumpkins!