How to Control Japanese Beetle

Hi again it's Jason from Fraser Valley Rose  Farm and I know it might seem a bit early   to start talking about the Japanese  beetle my roses are just putting on   their leaves some of them are starting to  put on their earliest of flower buds now   but later in the season June and July they will be  a problem in our gardens and this is a good time   to talk about it because their grubs are busily  chewing away at your turf grass roots right now   causing some damage and by the time they emerge  into your garden there are some things you can   do to prepare your yard for them and so i want  to talk about those today for some of my viewers   the Japanese beetle will need no introduction  you've seen them in large numbers in your garden   and you've seen the kind of damage that they  can do i'm going to show you some pictures now   they are a metallic looking beetle and they just  skeletonize plants they chew up the flowers they   chew up the leaves and you can see that on the  leaves from the pictures here that they just chew   between the veins and just leave just the shreds  of the plant left over they can cause massive   damage they have some favorite plants one of their  favorite plants of particular interest to me is   roses but they also love grapes they love hops  they love hydrangeas all sorts of trees and shrubs   so let's talk about their life cycle for just  one second because this will be of interest   in how you control them they live for 11 months  of the year or just about 11 months of the year   underground in their grub stage chewing at the  roots of your grasses then they emerge and they   are only out for about a four or five week period  um 40 days is what i hear is their sort of average   life cycle above the ground as adults so they come  out for two reasons they come out to eat and they   come out to procreate so they're out there to  to mate and so they're not usually alone they   come in big numbers and they tend to congregate  in those areas where they have attractive foods   they know those attractive foods by the smell of  them and so roses smell like good food to them   so do geraniums and we'll get back to geraniums  in just a second here one more quick note on   just on the idea of japanese beetles is that in  japan where they come from they're not a serious   pest they they cause a little bit of damage  but their environment is well balanced to the   japanese beetle here in north america we have  to take some measures to try to control them   because we just don't have an environment that's  well balanced to their annual emergence and then   disappearance under the ground  again so now i want to talk about   how to control them as adults in that  40-day period that they're above the ground   and then please hang out because i want to talk to  you about how to control them in their other stage   that grub stage because you have 11 months of the  year where you can control them in the grub stage   and it might be easier to or better for you to  control them when they're under the ground and not   attacking your shrubs then waiting until you  see them as adults so your japanese beetle   have been living under the ground in the grub  stage for 11 months they emerge as small adults   and as small adults early on they stick close to  the ground chewing up things just in that bottom   layer because they're not really big and they're  not flying around long distances this is a great   opportunity for you to determine how bad your  infestation will be this year and their favoritest   food in the world the thing that they go gaga  over is the geranium or the zonal geranium also   i guess you could call it a pelargonium  botanically if you have these zonal geraniums   in your garden in big numbers in the time that  they're expected to emerge so let's say in june   and july that's a great way for you to know how  bad your infestation is going to be because they   will congregate on those geraniums the other thing  that those geraniums will do and it's kind of a   funny irony their their favorite food in the world  also paralyzes them so when they go and eat the   flowers of the zonal geranium they will actually  fall over and be stunned for a period of time   this will make them very susceptible to predators  so having a large number of the zonal geraniums   gives you that opportunity to make  them more vulnerable to predators   you can also shake them off into a bucket of  soapy water and that will kill them so this is   your first line of monitoring and defense have  those zonal geraniums in your garden in large   numbers in june and july if you have if you've  seen japanese beetle damage in the past you kind   of know they're on their way this is a great way  to head them off at the pass and get a good idea   of what it will look like when they emerge higher  and start attacking your shrubs like roses so once   they're on the roses what can you do about them  well of course you know anything that you spray   can be a big damage to all of the insects  around and i know desperate times call   for desperate measures but there is a way around  this there is a bacterial agent that you can spray   onto your roses and onto your susceptible shrubs  called btg or bacillus bacteria that gets into the   guts of the japanese beetle as they eat and it  kills them so it's very targeted it's targeted   to the pests that are eating your plants and the  only the beetle pests that are eating your plants   so you don't end up killing off all of  their predators which would be a bad thing   so you actually just target the pest so  this is the number one way i would say   there's i think it's called beetle gone is the  product i've seen it marketed under has that   btg in it i'll put that up on the screen and if  you get that that's going to be your number one   line of defense for for killing off the adult  beetles the other way you can do it is you can   spray down some neem oil it works similarly  but it won't kill the adults it'll just stop   them from breeding so i guess that's a good way of  addressing their population over a length of time   but immediately i'm pretty sure you want to  protect your shrubs and to do that you'll want   to kill the adults i'm going to give you one more  piece of advice here and it's just a matter of   addressing your patience level and a practice of  butting your roses so obviously they're attracted   to the roses because of the floral scent if you  know from your geranium trap that they're going   to have a big infestation of the japanese beetle  it might make sense for you to disbud your roses   in the coming weeks remember they're only out  there for a total of 40 days the first 10 of which   they're staying close to the ground so you have  30 days basically from the time that they start   going upwards on the shrubs to disbud your  roses limit the amount of damage and then at   the time that they finish they're they're all gone  they've laid their eggs they're under the ground   uh then you can just let your roses continue  blooming or resume blooming and you'll get   the whole rest of the season so instead of being  something that you get so disheartened about that   you've lost your roses for for and they've damaged  your roses just understand going in that you're   going to have your roses up to june or july as  soon as you see the damage start to emerge the big   uh influx of adults you start dis budding your  roses and then you can have them from you know   august onwards and have no problem with your roses  now let's talk about the japanese beetle in their   grub stage and this is really important because  they are primarily a pest of lawn and turf so 11   months out of the year that's where they're living  and this is a great time to address them because   they are defenseless to you so remember in  that june july period they're up as adults   they lay their eggs into the lawn and sometime  in the range of september october in the fall   and then of course in the early spring as well  you're going to see damage all over that patch   of lawn you're going to see the damage of the  grubs the the feeding damage on the roots causes   brown patches in the lawn you also may see that  birds are starting to peck and cause damage trying   to go after those grubs so they're sitting there  defenseless you can apply measures to them right   now they're going to cause them not to emerge as  adults that you have to chase around the garden   so while they're there there are two traditional  biological defenses the first one is nematodes so   you water nematodes into the lawn the botanical or  the scientific names of these are heterorhapditis   and steinernema i'll put those up on the screen  so you don't have to remember them i think i've   seen them in a product formulated called lawn  guardian but there's probably other formulations   out there as well that heterohepatitis and  steiner nema are just little worms that will   find their way into the bodies of the grubs  underground and kill them before they emerge   the other one is the same bacteria i talked about  putting onto the foliage of your plants it's that   btg but it's in a formulation that's granular that  would go on to your lawn i think that one's called   grub begone or grub gone and again either  one of these formulations are both biological   controls that are very very targeted just at  the beetle grubs so they're not going to go   and poison a whole bunch of the life in underneath  your lawns they're just really focused on those   those beetle grubs all right that's all i have  for you today on the japanese beetle i hope these   measures are of some use to you i know some people  have been really really disheartened by the kind   of damage they see by japanese beetle but if you  take a few of these measures you should be able   to either eliminate or minimize the amount of  damage you see in your garden and if you have   any questions about this please drop those down  below the video i'll see what i can do to help

Channel: Fraser Valley Rose Farm

Views: 157,416

Rating: 4.9266138 out of 5

Keywords: japanese beetle, Popillia japonica, beneficial insects, biological control, kill beetle, kill beetle grubs, control japanese beetle, rose pests, rose gardening, june bug, june beetle

Id: 8sPnOVTmuso

Length: 9min 28sec (568 seconds)

Published: Sun Apr 25 2021