Have you browsed through all of the other "help with cuke beetle" discussions running here right now? A couple just a bit further down the page.

https://www.gardenweb.com/discussions/cornucop/query/control-cuke-beetles/nqrw

Dave

Yes unfortunately the number of threads discussing how to combat them shows the direct problem - there really is no 'sure fire' easy way of keeping them completely at bay. Even folks with insect netted greenhouses and double entry doors eventually get the cuke beetles.

I wont claim this works but I have some very limited experience with kaolin clay in my garden this year. It seemed like for the two weeks after I sprayed a liquid mixture (1 cup per gallon, shaken vigorously and sprayed with regular misting sprayer) that the cuke beetles were less present. Definitely didn't rid them, but it felt like the numbers were down. Could have been completely circumstantial and due to something else however. I also think that it helped keep my tomato plants a bit cooler during a spell of >92 deg f weather.

There are a number of other suggestions found in those many threads - Surround dust for one which is ORMI approved, DE, yellow sticky traps, NEEM, row covers, anything coated with Tanglefoot adhesive, beneficial insects, delayed planting, etc. to name just a few. All offer some degree of control without resorting to Sevin and other pesticides.

But no you aren't going to eliminate them completely. And you don't really need to. Their presence does not guarantee you will lose your plants, only that it is sometimes a possibility. Some of them MAY transmit disease but that doesn't mean they ALL do.

Gardening, especially organic gardening, is often just playing the odds. ;-)

Dave

Surround is difficult/expensive for me to obtain in Canada. I may try to make my own with kaolin clay.

DE I can try.

I have heard that yellow stickies can catch beneficials, including lizards and tree frogs. Southerners, be warned!

Neem is a thought.

Row covers won't work for climbers.

I do like the tanglefoot on a yellow paint scraper idea, for use every morning to catch them, although a bowl of soapy water works too as they tend to head DOWN.

I just don't see many beetles when I look, yet the damage is pretty bad. I do have a resident frog, so maybe he is helping to control them :)

Linda

"Row covers won't work for climbers."

Well it can be challenge but they can work with climbers. I just make a tent over whatever it is they are climbing - stakes, fence, trellis, etc. And if you can get plain Kaolin Clay you can mix it with DE and dust with it.

Dave