Larry I believe that grub worms turn into June bugs. I'm not sure if they damage anything or not as adults.

Looked them up. They eat tree leaves. Bad thing is they lay eggs that become grubs

Larry,

I thought I had posted something about them back in May. We had a ton of them at NSU and people were freaking out. But then someone found that our local CO-OP was handing out a leaflet from OSU, which explained that this is not a June bug but rather a highly beneficial insect called the Fiery Searcher.

I have been delighted to find these busily working my corn plants, before day break. They eat garden pests. I have only read that they go for caterpillars. Bu they must eat other pests too, as I don't have caterpillars in my corn, mainly just grasshoppes.

George

Here is a link that might be useful: Fiery Searcher? Nature in the Ozarks

Our "June Bugs" are the plain brown variety.

Larry, those are not the Japanese Beetles that Carol and I talked about. JPs are smaller and have less green and more copper. And the JPs are gone now; haven't seen one for almost 3 weeks. What you have looks like what we used to call June Bugs, which ermerge in July here. We have a few of them, but not a lot. At my Dad's though there are hundreds of them. I wanted to see the link that George posted but so far my computer is balking.

Mia, I have a lot of brown ones also, they seem to be a little smaller and will land on the shredded leaf mulch and be buried in 3 or 4 seconds. Of course I Have more grubs, moles and armadillos than I want also.

This is the second year I have tried "no till gardening" in part of my garden. I seem to have more insects when I don't till. One thing I like about my Mantis tiller is that it is a real "Grub Grinder".

Larry,

To me, the beetles in your hand look like Green June Beetles, which also sometimes are called Green June Bugs, but I've always known them as green scarab beetles because in Texas we called the little brown beetles June Bugs, even though they were more abundant in May.

In the link below, you can see a photo of a Green June Beetle on the left at the top of the page and a photo of a Japanese Beetle at the right for comparison's sake.

At our house we have both the fiery searchers that are shown in George's link and the Green June Beetles in small quantities, more so in spring than in the heat of the summer---so sometimes as early as April (in 2011 we had them out in March but it was hot very early that year).

We have oodles of the little brown June bugs like Mia mentioned, but for us they usually are most abundant here at our place from late April through late May in a typical year. I only see one occasionally after May, and I mean really occasionally, like maybe once a week. We're so far south that our bug cycles here are earlier than much of the rest of the state.

The fiery searchers were more numerous this year than in previous years. They can get really huge and if I didn't know that they were good guys, seeing them would freak me out. Whenever I had to do the springtime 'frost is coming, cover up the plants" routine about once a week this year, I'd always find fiery searchers on top of the floating row covers every morning when I went outside to uncover the plants.

One disadvantage of no-till gardening is that it is harder to kill pests since you aren't rototilling them and exposing them to the elements. You can spread Milky Spore Powder on lawn areas in August to treat the grubs that get in the lawn. It is an organic product. For insects that overwinter in garden soil, you can use beneficial nematodes which will kill many soil-dwelling pests. The nematodes are very small and invisible to the human eye but they are pretty effective when the soil is treated at the right time. You can apply beneficial nematodes with a watering can or a hose-end sprayer.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: Green June Beetles vs. Japanese Beetles

The brown ones are may beetles amd the green ones are june bugs. At least thats we always called them, but really, i just call them all June bugs. . As for the june bugs, yes, the eggs become grubs and the grubs become the bug..... But, the grubs will eat vegetation underground and the bugs can destroy a lawn if you are overrun. This is all from what i was told my by MIL several years ago. Other than, my problem is with armadillos trying to dig up my flower beds to get to the grubs. That is personal experience.

Emma

Ever since I was a child, I've heard the small brown ones called May Beetles. I still haven't been able to see the Fiery Searcher--lazy computer.

Dorothy, I'll find and link a photo of just the fiery searcher. George's link was a blog. Maybe your computer doesn't want to load the whole blog. I have had to double click on links here at GW lately to get them to load. I don't know why. One click used to work just fine.

Among other things, the fiery searchers eat CPBs.

Dawn

Here is a link that might be useful: photo: fiery searcher beetle

Thanks, Dawn. I never knew such a thing existed. They seem to be a little bigger and fiercer looking than the June Beetles that Larry had. I'll have to look closely and see if we have them. Have a ton of Assasin Bugs aka Wheel Bugs this year though. And too many grasshoppers though not as many as George has.

You're welcome, Dorothy.

I've been seeing those fiery searchers for a good 6 or 8 years. They might have been here earlier and I might not have been paying attention. This year I had to cover up the potato beds over and over again with all those late freezes and I always saw the fiery searchers there. They are pretty fierce and I wouldn'[t mess with one because it just might bite me. I'm glad to see them though, since they are good garden helpers.

Every morning I think of George's grasshoppers when I walk out to the garden or compost pile and watch the hoppers fly up around me with every step I take. There's more and more every day and, while the numbers I am seeing are increasingly worse, they still don't come close to the population George has had this year. We have has lots of wheel bugs too, and now we are seeing lots of those awful leaf-footed bugs. Stink bugs were worse a month ago than they are now, so at least there's that.

August is the cruelest month, between the heat and the pests. I'm just counting the days until September and cooler weather with lower pest levels.

Dawn

I have now proven, by personal experience, that wheel bugs bite humans, and that it really hurts! The other day I was trying to set a bucket of water over a barbed wire fence. I leaned over and rested my hand on the wire (between barbs) so as to push the wire down and avoid the barbs. What I didn't realize was that there was a wheel bug sitting on that wire, right where I pushed down. He got me good! It felt more like a bite than a bee sting. But the pain lasted about like a bee sting and it hurt that much. I grabbed my hand and... apologized for mashing down on him.

There are a few plants/places which are especially popular with the grasshoppers. I sometimes come upon, as many as five wheel bugs at those places. They are obviously having a great time.

I wish I had the capability of taking close up pictures in the dark. While vacuuming I have seen some beautiful and interesting things. I've come upon an inch long green praying mantis, sitting on the crown of an okra plant, looking like she just wanted to grow, so she could eat those grasshoppers around her. I've found tree frogs on my corn, obviously hunting insects.

I have two winter squash which have survived the squash bugs and grasshoppers and look like they will produce. Old Timey Cornfield Pumpkin is out where the grasshoppers are at their worst. They have stripped a number of its leaves. But it is growing faster than they are eating and really beginning to cover a lot of ground. This morning I took the time to vacuum a lot of grasshoppers off of it, hoping to give it more breathing space. The other, a White Cushaw from Illinois, is in a garden with just a little less grasshopper pressure, due to our poultry being nearby. The White Cushaw has not been affected at all, and it's setting on fruit now.

George

George, there are so many interesting things about your post. First, I think the wheel bugs are interesting, I have a few, but not near as many as last year. Second, if your squash and pumpkins are sitting fruit it gives me hope that mine are sitting fruit in time for a good harvest. ( have set 100 finished fruit as a goal, and at the rate things are going I expect to exceed my goal.)

I took a closer look this morning and it looks like the June bugs are eating my plants, but not near as bad as the grasshoppers.

Larry

George, Glenn learned that wheel bugs bite a couple years ago. Somehow one ended up caught between his slide strap and his foot and bit him. He said it was really painful.

Dawn, so far August is wonderful at our house temp wise but if it stays as cloudy as it has started out, the plants are going to be needing sun.

George, I always heard that wheel bugs could inflict a pretty painful bite. I'm sorry that one got you. We have had the wheel bugs in odd places this year, including sitting on brown lawn furniture. The cushions have flowers, so maybe they think the cushions will attract something for them to eat. We've also had them sitting on the water faucet, so I do have to watch where I put my hands.

I know that I have fruit on Long Island Cheese, Old-Timey Cornfield Pumpkin and Seminole, but haven't ventured into the pumpkin/winter squash jungle to see if the other varieties have set. One C. moschata died, and it looked like bacterial wilt. I had had squash bugs on a yellow straightneck near it earlier in the year, so they may have vectored the wilt to that C. moschata that wilted (think it was Long of Naples but could have been Musquee de Provence).

Larry, It's too bad that the grasshoppers and June bugs don't eat each other. That would be wonderful, wouldn't it?

Are any of y'all seeing blister beetles? I have seen a moderate number of squash bugs (tried to kill them all and squish their eggs), quite a few leaf-footed bugs but only 1 or 2 blister beetles. Normally, I wouldn't miss the blister beetles, but we need them here to eat grasshopper eggs this fall or next year will be pretty awful.

Dorothy, I'm glad y'all are having a good August.

About the best thing I can say about this summer is that it was pretty wonderful until August arrived. That's okay, though. We always are miserably hot, dry and overrun by pests in August, so it isn't like it is anything new. Our heat index for most of the last week has been between 105-110, so I try to get out, do my work and get back inside ridiculously early. I get bored in August because it is too hot and I am stuck indoors too much just to escape the heat.

With this heat, our grasses are drying up too quickly. Pastures that were a gorgeous green only one week ago are now turning tan. I am kind of shocked at how fast it is drying out again.

I wish we could send you sunshine and y'all could send us clouds and rain. It would be a nice swap.

I've moved all the containers (except for 5 in the back garden that are too heavy to move) onto the patio where they get morning sun until around noon, and then are in full shade. We now have so many plants on the patio that a person cannot really walk or sit on it, but the cats and the grasshoppers stay there in the shade a lot. I'm not moving the plants off the patio until it cools off a bit.

Now we are getting those huge grasshoppers that are yellowish and about 5" long.They fly in from the fields. I hate them.They don't seem to have much fear of humans and sometimes they land on my finger or in my hair. I try to stomp them to death when I see one on the ground, but they are fast and usually jump before I can get them. I guess that is what passes for gardening work in August....trying to stomp big grasshoppers to death.

The hummingbirds are on the move. I think some have begun migrating because the traffic at our hummingbird feeders has increased a great deal in the last week or so. This year I've noticed lots of hummingbirds visiting the plants growing on the fence in the back garden, particularly the area where there's winter squash growing on the fence. They seem fascinated with the huge yellow blooms.

Dawn

I have seen some black blister beetles, they don't seem to run in packs like the striped ones do. The past two years I have been over run with the striped ones, but so far this year I have seen none.

I've seen, perhaps 100 black blister beetles. But they haven't been in packs. The most I've seen together were about a dozen, and I got them all. Both the black and the striped run in packs here. But the striped are harder to deal with as they are faster and more agile.

Dorothy, I grew up with these cloudy skies and frequent showers. Don't worrry. The plants will do well. There is a lot more solar power coming through those clouds than one would think.

George

I grew up with foggy mornings all summer, George, living only a mile up from Puget Sound, and can remember well getting sunburned on a "cloudy" day. So I'm not complaining about the last few cloudy days. It's a welcome break and allows us to be in the garden for longer each morning. (I do remember that we didn't get tomatoes until August in Washington, and couldn't grow okra at all. We had lettuce and pole beans all summer though.)