Supplemental Feeding of Japanese Beetles Using a Low-cost Bio-attractor

[aart]

Slight problem, somebody consumed the part of lure designed to bring in male beetles.

Inside the pen?

 

[centrarchid]

I am not seeing how the Volterra Principal applies to Japanese Beetles in the US. They are not targeted by environmental scale pesticide use and they are too mobile as adults to be impacted by garden level insecticide use.

 

[centrarchid]

Inside the pen?

Yes. I am trying to confine action so I can more accurately access patterns in beetle consumption by the chickens.

 

[aart]

I am not seeing how the Volterra Principal applies to Japanese Beetles in the US. They are not targeted by environmental scale pesticide use and they are too mobile as adults to be impacted by garden level insecticide use.

But JB do have natural predators and garden level pesticides can kill those predators, allowing JB to be more prolific. But, yes, sorry, it doesn't apply to your situation.

 

[aart]

Yes. I am trying to confine action so I can more accurately access patterns in beetle consumption by the chickens.

Chickens eating the lures? Adds another variable to your experiment.

 

[centrarchid]

But JB do have natural predators and garden level pesticides can kill those predators, allowing JB to be more prolific. But, yes, sorry, it doesn't apply to your situation.

I am not seeing any garden level predators that eat JP regularly. Same pattern holds when the beetles are outside the garden which is 99% of time here. The beetles overwhelm the capacity of predators to consume them. Robber flies and spiders seem to be the only critters that eat a lot of JP and they simply are not abundant enough.

 

[OhZark Biddies]

hmm, so I need some ragweed and some lure to attract more Japanese Beetles to offset my feed costs?

Pretty sure I'd rather just buy more feed!

Just joking.... I understand the "experimental" nature of the thread, and appreciate you sharing your findings.

The beetles have been much fewer here than last year ( I'm about an hour south of Jeff City) . I think because they were so heavy last year, many more people around me put out traps this year. Which has attracted the beetles to their properties and pulled them away from mine.

This seems to support what I've read about the traps and lures pulling in a lot of beetles, but only catching a certain percentage of those, which results in having more uncaught beetles drawn to our place, than what would have been there if we were to do nothing at all.

Example (note my numbers are all just made up):

beetles occurring with no lure and traps: 200

• beetles caught by hand picking them off the garden plants: 50
  
• beetles killed by spot spraying permethrin: 100
  
• beetles not caught/killed and left to breed for next year: 50

beetles occurring when lure traps bring them in: 1000

• beetles caught by trap: 75% = 750
  
• beetles not caught by trap and left to breed for next year: 25% = 150

The takeaway for me being I'll let my neighbors put out the traps and talk about how bad the beetles are and how many they've caught, and I'll just play dumb and tell them they probably need a couple more lure traps.

 

[centrarchid]

I would like to take you on a motorcycle or gator ride up here to show you what I am seeing even when not traps / lures are involved. You will see all your numbers, and I mean all, are orders of magnitude too low. Most of the beetles are having little or anything to do with our yards or horticulture efforts.

 

[centrarchid]

Come up to our Lincoln University Carver Farm on sunny day while the beetles are still abundant. You will see rivers of flying beetles. Most are not alighting on plants people see but they are very much present. When drive your way in route to Ava I can see the rivers there as well.

 

[OhZark Biddies]

I would like to take you on a motorcycle or gator ride up here to show you what I am seeing even when not traps / lures are involved. You will see all your numbers, and I mean all, are orders of magnitude too low. Most of the beetles are having little or anything to do with our yards or horticulture efforts.

My numbers were not meant to be accurate in any way... other than to explain the concept of what you just said:
"Most of the beetles are having little or anything to do with our yards or horticulture efforts"

And therefore using lure traps in our gardens and yards, is simply pulling in more beetles.... and those are beetles that would otherwise not be in our gardens or yards.

And since the lure traps are not 100% effective at trapping the beetles that they lure... the net result are more beetles in our gardens and yards.

Of course if the goal of your experiments is indeed to bring in more beetles in order to feed chickens, then that is different.

My goals are not to have ragweed and Japanese beetles though.