Hi Roxana,

You can use a neem-based spray to address some insect issues. I don't generally use it in my own garden aside from when I bring new plants in, or on my house plants (because of mites and such). I did try some when I was having a minor outbreak of midge (introduced on a mail order plant -- now I wash the plants and spray with neem because of that). However, I think that bagging up all of the top soil in the vicinity of the infected plant was what actually helped my midge situation, not the neem.

As for diseases, aphids, and the like -- I mostly let them take their course and accept them as a part of gardening. A very thin layer of mulch in spring (I use cedar) seems to keep blackspot pressure low for most of my roses. The huge amount of sun that they get probably helps more than anything I could ever do to treat them. If I see anything that really annoys me (like rose slugs) I kill them by hand. The beneficial insects in my garden do a lot of heavy lifting.

Having said all of the above, I think your situation is probably different from mine. If you are in Indiana, you probably have lots of Japanese beetles. Neem isn't going to do anything against them. The best organic controls for Japanese beetles are 1) living in an area where people do not water their lawns, 2) applying milky spore to lawns in the area, 3) inspecting the bushes and hand-picking beetles, putting the beetles into a container of soapy water. For roses, it can be helpful if you cut your blooms as they are opening during beetle season and bring them in as bouquets. If you leave them in the garden they are bound to get eaten.

Interplant with flowers in the compositae group. They seem to harbor a lot of predatory insects and smaller beasties that are born hungry for insect, mite, aphid etc. meals.

You'll never have an insect-less garden unless you live in the middle of a desert, no neighbors, no water, no plants, and no wind to bring the problems in. What I aim for is to reduce the problems by trying to be laid back and analytical.

No, we do not use anything like that. What we do is prune the roses (if thy need it - some don't) sometime between Jan and March (we live in a warm climate), and put about a layer of 2 inches of compost around the base then. We do get some aphids, but also the "good" bugs which eat them (as well as some lovely tiny birds which eat them!). I gave up spraying poisons on my garden about 25 years ago, and after a couple of years the good predator bugs were able to balance out the bad ones.

We really don't have problems from bugs (there are no Japanese beetles here, thank heavens), except sometimes on roses with small, light colored blooms in the Spring. Then some years horrid little beetles called curculio beetles show up. They are the color, size and shape of Lady Bugs, except that they have very long black snouts. Somehow they use these to drill into the small rose buds and plant their eggs. All of the buds they do this to die, and you can see them drooped over on the bush. Very disheartening. Now that I know about them, I keep an eye out, and at the first sign, I get a large paper bag, and pick off all of the damaged buds. (Otherwise they will fall off, and the eggs will produce a new crop of beetles the next year). Then I hand pick the beetles. The only way to do that is to hold the bag underneath them and try to grab them. Their defense mechanism is to drop vertically immediately, so I miss most of them, but they fall right into the bag. Then I look carefully at any nearby bushes with small blooms to see if they are anywhere else. So far they have only appeared on 3-4 roses. After I did this several years in a row, I stopped seeing them except once every 5 years or so. Come to think of it, I haven't seen any for over 5 years now - I need to look around.

Jackie

I too will get those dreaded Hoplia beetles. I find that they like the lighter colored roses and will bore themselves inside the rose. When I find them I make sure I snip them in half with my pruners (revenge for ruining my flowers) and get rid of the bloom so they don't reproduce. They are usually gone by the end of May (thank goodness!). There really isn't a "cure" for them that doesn't hurt some other beneficial insect that I want in my garden.

I have heard that you can place white buckets with water and drop or two of soap (just enough to break the tension of the surface of the water) and the beetles will be drawn to it (they like light colored things) and drown. I haven't tried it so I have no proof that it works or not. With my luck, I wouldn't watch where I was going and step in the thing and practically fall into my roses (not good!).

In my area, Chilli Thrips have not YET shown up, and RRD is heading our way, but not yet here. Our insect pests are aphids, Grasshoppers, the occasional fig beetle, and the like. If their timing is right, flocks of bushtits show up and clean the aphids off in a few hours.

We prune a little (not much this year, as it rained right through any opportunity to do that) and wash roses off with a garden hose.

Long ago, we were taught to spray preventively with systemic pesticides but we have not done that for 20 years. If a rose has horrible disease problems, it just won't stay here. Some roses here are still waiting for warmer weather. The Teas and Chinas bloomed through the winter and aren't going to stop. The "Grandmother's Hat" bushes will be putting on a huge show in a few more days.