AboutLong Island Gardener Expertise There is NO EXCUSE today for a gardener to use chemicals. Perfect Lawns? Pristine Roses? Immaculate Flowers all Summer long? If you live in the Northeast/Atlantic Coast, I'll guide you down the non-toxic road to Organica - and you will not believe how easy it can be. Yes, it can be complicated, but backing off from Ortho and Scotts is not as hard as you think. Your neighbors won't believe their eyes. I have intelligent answers on soil care, bug killing, weed control and fungus-freedom!
Experience I have college credits in horticulture and botany, and 30 years of gardening for personal pleasure. Plus I am a volunteer docent at the local botanical gardens. But a person's real gardening skills are learned from trial and error. I am strict about not using chemicals in the garden. Always have been. Always will be.
Question I have planted a garden every year for 10 years now and fought the normal pests along the way...and won every time. I am at a loss now because the last 2 years I've had a strange new bug emerge on my green bean and wax bean plants and I can't get rid of them. I have searched the internet and can not find what it is. It is a yellow bug with chunks of black hair coming off their body. They are small bugs with sticky little bottoms. It's hard to pull them off the plants. I'd really like to know what they are, how I could have gotten them and how to eradicate them (without using toxic mixes, which I don't want to do!)I try growing my beans in different areas of the garden, but they keep coming back. Doesn't matter if it's a bush bean or pole bean. They start eating the leaves, then work their way to the bean itself. A couple here and there would not be so bad, but I'm talking infestation here...help!!
Answer Your biggest mistake: No crop rotation.
There's a reason crop rotation works. Few pests can get a destructive grip on territory in a single season, and they can't wait around twiddling their thumbs until their Dinner of Choice returns 2 or 3 seasons later. Much easier to move on to a more guaranteed buffet.
But give them 2 straight seasons back to back, and you're asking for trouble. In your case, if I understand you correctly, you gave them a decade's run of the garden. Along the way, weird things started showing up, rearing their heads like Putin over Alaska.
You do leave out a few details that unfortunately would be a key to identification of this bad bug.
For one, I have no idea whatsoever where on Earth you are growing these beans. OK, I can probably cross out the North and South Poles and further south, but how much? What hemisphere are you in? Is it Summer? Need to know this. A zipcode if you are in the USA would be best. Don't worry, I won't show up at your door.
Next: Was this "bug" a worm? A larvae? Did it have wings? Did it fly or jump or crawl over the leaves and beans? Any eggs or other versions of this?
Finally: Would you please confirm that you did not practice crop rotation; confirm you did not use traditional pesticides OR any "organic" pesticide; did not use anything stronger than Water to eject these unwanted visitors from the leaves of those Beans.
Oh... I would like to know what Beans you are growing just in case this is a factor in the narrowed down field of pests. If you happen to know, good. Any companion plants you grow with them should also be mentioned, and in that case I would like to know if you see them being attacked, too.
Thank you for writing. Please address these issues so that we can solve your problem before the Season begins (or ends, as the case may be, should you be gardening in the Southern Hemisphere).
Remember, I get questions from all over the planet -- India, Spain, Mexico, South America, you name it they read and write it.
