Yeah! It's Bud Worm Season. Pics

Really yes thats it praying mantis

Next year I am going to get an army of praying mantis'. They are the lion of the insect world!

there was one flying around my girlfriends room the other night. i got a sweet vide of it, i took em outside and let em go.

as for worms, ive found 2 so far on my hollands hope plant. i just smush them.. havent found signs of worms eating heavily and still no bt. i gotta go get some but im broke!

ladybugs work good they will actually go inside your buds and get those cats out. matis might catch a moth before it lays its eggs

so ladybugs good huh? ok

I bet those worms are super stoned those buds look nice

sonofnothing said:

so ladybugs good huh? ok

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Due to a cool Spring, the ladybugs didn't arrive on schedule, opening the way for thrips, spider mites, aphids(first time ever, on Cannabis) and white flies.

I purchased and applied several thousand ladybugs several times, but too late to do more than make a dent.

I also save Mantid egg cases, placing them in quiet safe corners along the fence and in the greenhouses.

When small, they eat a ton of the tiny critters, but grow too fast to remain effective for long.

Garden spiders also thrive in my garden. They eat a lot of butterflies.

Still, for caterpillars, BT is the only really effective treatment.

I happened to notice an egg case hatching one day, on my remesh trellis. The mantis pictured is about 1/4" long. The other pix were taken about a week later.

what do they eat when they get bigger?

yep, mantis eat mainly the larger bugs, like flies / grasshoppers / bees / moths/ butterflies / spiders / etc.
so, not effective for caterpillars. + mantis will not go digging through your buds to find bugs to eat, they don't have the ability to do so (do not burrow). They wait for prey to pass by.

Ladybugs go in hibernation and fly away into the mountains or huddle in a nest with a bunch of other ladybugs (I think in the Fall?), so not very effective either.

To the guy saying no money for BT, better get on that shit, it's only $10 for a small bottle. Caterpillars are no joke and will destroy your plant faster than you know it. You may think there's only 1 or 2, but realistically do you think a moth / butterfly is only going to lay 2 eggs? Most of them are tiny and hiding inside the buds or burrowed into the stems already.

anomolies said:

yep, mantis eat mainly the larger bugs, like flies / grasshoppers / bees / moths/ butterflies / spiders / etc.
so, not effective for caterpillars. + mantis will not go digging through your buds to find bugs to eat, they don't have the ability to do so (do not burrow). They wait for prey to pass by.

Ladybugs go in hibernation and fly away into the mountains or huddle in a nest with a bunch of other ladybugs (I think in the Fall?), so not very effective either.

To the guy saying no money for BT, better get on that shit, it's only $10 for a small bottle. Caterpillars are no joke and will destroy your plant faster than you know it. You may think there's only 1 or 2, but realistically do you think a moth / butterfly is only going to lay 2 eggs? Most of them are tiny and hiding inside the buds or burrowed into the stems already.

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Exactly.

I used to find worms or insects and feed the mantises.

Ever watched half a worm disappear?

Mantises are FAST.

Caterpillars are invisible, inside the buds, until the buds begin to rot.

veggiegardener said:

Caterpillars are invisible, inside the buds, until the buds begin to rot.

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amen!

Early am and right at dusk is the best time to look for caterpillers for you hand pickers... I catch them napping on the SURFACE of the bud right at first light before they warm up. They seem to come out to grab breakfast and warm up. The evening as well but early am has always been best!! Or use BT and sleep in...lol.

After spraying BT a week ago, I still am finding caterpillars! I hand pick them out if I can find them but I'm worried about damaging my buds. Also, their poop has gotten in some pretty tight pockets next to the stem. Is there any way to remove these so they don't cause mold? I'm so fucking pissed because this happened to me last season. Thanks for any ideas.

My pillars are more like stem borers. They live somewhere in your stem, close to where you see the poo. (Usually where a leaf meets the stem). They move upward eating and pooing inside the stem. I remove the leaf where I see the poo, thats where I find the entry hole. The pillars are about 1/4 inch long, tan with brown heads. I have sliced the stem length wise to pick the damm things out the plant recovered well. If I was unable to, or couldnt bring myself to slice at it, I took a pin and stabbed the stem upwards for about two inches. The damage did cease after stabbing the plant and I hardly think the plant even noticed. I must have killed alot of them this way. I picked any poopie stuff off and tossed it. (kinda like a marijuana torture chamber for worms) Oyeah I started using a Safer BT powder and havent seen any since.

veggiegardener said:

Exactly.

I used to find worms or insects and feed the mantises.

Ever watched half a worm disappear?

Mantises are FAST.

Caterpillars are invisible, inside the buds, until the buds begin to rot.

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hAHA, when I was a kid i used to squish a bunch of aphids together (kinda like a hash ball) and feed it to mantis that I kept as pets. Otherwise they only eat bugs that they can catch with their arms.

BT finally worked, I had to spray like every 3 days and hand-pick in between.
I see a shriveled up caterpillar here and there, just hanging off a stem, and I'm like, "Couldn't find the bathroom in time huh? That's what you get fucker!"

On a side note I think 2 tsp/gal might have been too much it started shriveling the hairs. Anyone else having this problem?



Don't worry about the poop, it doesn't cause mold. At least not for me. I think all the budworms everyone here is having burrow into the stems anyway. Just spray the buds like mad. I make sure to drench EVERY single bud inside and out. I think it only sleeps inside the stem to avoid the cold at night or something. They feed during the day.

lol, stabbing the stem with a needle is pretty crazy they must be like "wtf ahhhh help me!". Though unnecessary, they don't hide in the stem forever so eventually when they come out they come into contact with the BT and die of horrible diarrhea.

bchboy147 said:

View attachment 1210399After spraying BT a week ago, I still am finding caterpillars! I hand pick them out if I can find them but I'm worried about damaging my buds. Also, their poop has gotten in some pretty tight pockets next to the stem. Is there any way to remove these so they don't cause mold? I'm so fucking pissed because this happened to me last season. Thanks for any ideas.

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if you already have worms it's not gonna work unless you spray it like 10 times. BT is much better as a preventative sprayed every 3-10 days throughout the end of veg and flower. once you get those bastards it's really hard(impossible) to reverse the damage.

I guess im a lucky McGee. The ONLY problems ive had this outdoor season were minor spider mites. Got rid of those with some eucalyptus. Them worms are nasty tho. Hope i beat around em again. Then again im sure growing them in containers and not having multiple variety plants around prevented me from bug invasion.

those fucking worms got me dirty.... my plant turned out bomb too but i only harvested a lil under a zip.... THEY ROBBED ME..... I was growing up a tree somewhere where i couldnt check on it a lot and well thats the way the cookie crumbles...

I've read this whole thing and the last outdoor grow I did was thankfully not affected. Next year doing another outdoor grow (colorado right where forest and desert meet) and from the moment the clones hit the dirt (April) till harvest (November) what should the anti-piller routine be. Got the bear and moose piss for the big problems but it's the little ones that worry me!

Yikes, don't bring those things to Texas, looks like a Cali thing.