These do eat plants when their numbers are high. They do. There should be no debating this. If anyone doesn't believe it, they haven't had an infestation of pill bugs and don't really have the experience to help someone regarding. I cannot grow legume or peas without killing these bugs in the area or they will take down every one of the healthy seedlings. I drench the soil in the area with liquid spinosad. Once the plant is established, it's good. I gotta eat, too. I read somewhere that pill bugs remove metals and is likely to remove some toxins in the soil. I'm still trying to figure why I have so many and what purpose they are serving beyond the normal "eat decaying matter".

Hi James, My solver book lists two causes: New foliage yellows and droops New doliage on a Canada hemlock or Carolina hemlock turns yellow and droops. It is often covered with yellow powder. Neeldes fall, leaving a crooked twig. Cones are also attacked. Ona badly infected tree, most shoot tips turn brown and die, makeing the tree look scorched. Cause: Hemlock neele rust can be caused by two closely related fungi. The yellow, dusty spores either overwinter on the dead shoots or drift to an alternate host in the poplar family, which includes aspen and cottonwoods as well as poplar trees. Solution: Spray fungicide and practice good garden sanitation to limit the spread of rust. - If a tree is small, spray organic lime-sulfur fungicide weekly for a month, starting when new growth first emergres. Follow label directions carefully. - To minimize future problems, rake and disposed of fallen leaves of host trees in the poplar family, through summer and fall. - In late winter, spray infected trees with an organic lime-sulfur fungicide to kill overwintering spores. Follow label directions carefully. The other they list is: Large patches of brown needles suddenly appear Brown needles develop in patches, the patches spread, affecting entire branches, which then begin to die. The tree shows no signs of insect damage or disease. Cause: Hemlocks are sensitive to weed killers. They can be accidentally exposed when herbicide spray drifts to them on the wind, or when herbicide applied to the soil migrates into their root zone. - 'be careful with air movement' - Avoid soil-active herbicides, such as tebuthiuron, which damage or kill large hemlocks and other species growing over 100 yards away, through root absorption. There's a start. Dax

Jim I hadn't read that cowpea thread, and it doesn't have a lot of information, does it? As I kept looking on the internet for answers, I was really leaning toward thrip damage. Thrips are minute insects found on the leaves and in blooms (Photo 126) of both snap bean and cowpea. Adults are tan to dark brown and about 1mm. long. Two pairs of wings are present and long hairs occur on the edges of the wings (Photo 127). Immature thrips are smaller and lighter in color. Adults and immature stages "rasp" the plant surface with their mouthparts and feed on the exuding plant sap. After mating, females insert eggs into the plant tissue. Larvae emerge and feed by scraping the plant surface and ingesting plant sap. Maturity is reached in less than one week and pupation occurs in soil. Adults emerge in about four days and the cycle is repeated. Multiple generations occur annually in Arkansas. On snap bean, thrips rarely cause significant injury although high populations can cause leaves to curl. Because of the rapid growth of snap bean this damage has little effect on snap bean yield. On cowpea, however, thrips generally constitute the major insect pest in Arkansas. As soon as cowpea plants emerge, thrips attack the new foliage. The result is leaf distortion and yellowing (Photo128). Although seedling injury appears substantial, studies have shown the cowpea tolerates high numbers of seedling thrips with little effect on yield. The greatest impact of thrips is on blooming cowpea. Flower thrips feed within the bloom and often significantly reduce cowpea yield. Management: On commercial snap bean, thrips rarely reduce yield and toleration is generally the best policy. This is also the case with thrips on seedling cowpea. Although damage on cowpea seedlings may appear severe, plant appearance greatly improves in about two weeks. Flower thrips can be successfully managed on cowpea with systemic insecticides, including acephate and imidacloprid. In periods of drought, a single application of acephate just prior to cowpea bloom has often resulted in substantial yield increases. The future registration of acephate for use on cowpea and other vegetables is currently unclear due to label changes. Thus, prior to its use, registration should be confirmed. Since this was a discussion of cowpea pests in Arkansas and Georgia is close to Arkansas, I concluded they were the problem. Thrips are extremely small and are not easily visible. But I did see a tiny pale brown thread-like attachment to a stem that might have been a thrip. Since thrip damage is certainly unsightly but apparently tolerable most of the time, that would fit your experience of leaf distortion and yellow leaves not being terribly destructive to production or plant life. No, I don't have severely yellow leaves, but the leaf-distortion is brand new so it could be coming. Of course, there are several varieties of thrips that might be local in your area and in California. The recommended use of a systemic insecticide in the event of inundation makes me shake my head. I'd never use a systemic and then eat the beans. I'll go with the unsightly leaves if thrips are the cause. In the meantime, I've put strips of aluminum foil down among the stems in hopes of confusing the insects (if that's what they are) and driving them away. I'll be interested to see if this damage is alleviated soon.

Amy, I can totally relate to that. Kim, I have wondered if the use of Round-Up Ready crops contributes to drift issues since it means that specific herbicide is being used more heavily by growers growing RR crops since it won't kill their crops. For a long time, the conventional wisdom was that drift generally comes from less than a mile away, but I think it comes from much further away at times. I also think some of the ester formulations of herbicides are more volatile and are related to the increase in drift. I used to only see drift damage infrequently in our early years here, and there were a lot more active farmers and ranchers around us back then. Now I see it more often, but the folks still ranching and farming near us don't seem to use herbicides that much any more. I hardly ever see one of them out in a field pulling a spray tank behind the tractor. A lot of those farms and ranches that were working operations when we moved here have been replaced by homes, businesses, etc. although, of course, residents and business owners can use herbicides too. It does really stink. I usually can look at the degree of damage and guesstimate if I think a given plant will survive. I guess correctly most of the time. The more damage to the plant, the less likely that it will survive. Some of the plants that survived the first round of drift and that had started to grow new foliage now are dying. The first round likely didn't kill them, but I think the second one will. The second round of drift also killed the morning glories growing on the fence that I hoped would serve as a living wall and would take the herbicide hit and, therefore, save the plants. With the first round, the morning glories were too short and the drift apparently went right over them. This last round got them at about 5' above the ground. That was my first clue---I was walking past the garden on my way down to the mailbox and saw the damage on the MGs, and then I looked beyond them at the adjacent tomato plants and saw the new round of damage. In our early years here, I had more glyphosate damage, but in more recent years we have had more 2, 4-d damage. Either way, it is becoming more and more of an issue. One year we had damage from both appear in the garden at the same time. In every instance that I have had herbicide drift, it has hit plants on the south or the east side of the garden, but not on the west or the north. Technically, the person spraying the herbicide is both legally and morally responsible for the damage done by herbicide drift, but it is almost impossible to prove where the drift came from. Western Farmer had a great piece about herbicide drift last year. I'll see if I can find it online and link it. Dawn Here is a link that might be useful: Herbicide Drift