Squishy Black Aphids on My Broad Beans

[Jessiebean]

What should do to these aphids that will stop any damage to my plants .. as you might have guessed I am squishing them but does anyone know of a tried and true way to prevent them from damaging my beans?

[Urban Ayisha]

i think what most people do is pinch out the top few inches which hopefully will remove most of the area, then u can also try a solution of washing up liquid and water in a spray bottle, but as for tried and true and permanent...

[Millymollymandy]

http://www.selfsufficientish.com/forum/ ... 1&start=15

Read the bit I posted on page 2 about putting down jam - it really worked!!!

[Jessiebean]

ooh yes I read about the jam- the key is really to get rid of the ants?
I would prefer not to pinch out the places the aphids are.. they are mostly on flowers...
I will try a detergent I think...

[Millymollymandy]

The ants, which farm the aphids for the sweet sticky honeydew that they secrete, prefer jam! It seems that by diverting the ants then (1) predators such as ladybirds can get at the aphids but I found that somehow the aphids just died off within days - really wierd! I left it a bit late this year but next I will get in there quick with the jam.

Tried the jam trick again this summer as soon as I saw aphids on my purple sprouting brocolli but the wierd thing is that tons of honey bees came along and ate all the jam (in record time!) so the ants didn't get much although the aphids didn't in the end become a problem.

[grahamhobbs]

Try planting nasturiums near by. This year everyone around was complaining it was bad for blackfly. We have a load of nasturiums growing on our plot and our broad beans were left virtually untouched by the blackfly. What little there was we simply hosed off.
Nasturiums not only attact blackfly away from your broad beans but also cabbage white butterflies from your brassicas. Believe me it works!

[MuddyWitch]

MMM,

I don't wish to deprive the honey bees of your lovely jam, as they need all the help they can get, but why not put the blob under a plant pot? (yogurt, or similar, with no drain holes) Ants could get to it (the desired result), but bees couldn't.

MW

[Jessiebean]

I have nasturtiums planted next to the beans- I will check to see if the ones close to the nasturtiums are bug free... I wonder if marmelade would work instead of jam.. or ant-rid?

[Millymollymandy]

Jessie - I used 4 year old cucumber and ginger jam and as it's rather runny they loved it and after eating all the sticky stuff they then scoffed the lumps of cucumber! (Both bees and ants!)

Muddy - that's a good idea - the bees literally ate in a couple of hours what the ants took a week to eat! I don't have THAT much old jam to use up.

[Millymollymandy]

Hey I've just had a bright idea - get me a beehive and start producing and selling cucumber and ginger honey!!!

[Jessiebean]

The bean plants near the nasturtiums are aphid free but, interestingly they are smaller than the ones further from the nasturtiums, which are infested.
Good idea about covering the jam BTW.

[MuddyWitch]

Millymollymandy

Hey I've just had a bright idea - get me a beehive and start producing and selling cucumber and ginger honey!!!

Whilst I would never discourage anyone from keeping bees, are you sure your jam production could keep up?!

I saw a sign once that read: "Whilst we garden organically, and encourage our bees to stay in the garden, we can't guarreentee thay are that sensible! Hence our honey can only be discribed as 'probably organic'!"

MW

[Jessiebean]

I did get a super squirtybottle and my Darling husband likes shooting the aphids off the beans (with appropriate laser gun noises) he was out there for about 20 minutes this morning. I also poured some failed praline into the garden near the beans so the ants would prefer in and popped a wee bit of antrid on the surface (with a container on top so only ants would find it....
so far things are going well...defintely a reduction in numbers and baby beans are showing themselves....
it is a pity that I don't know if I feel like broad beans now! I had the craving two months ago!

[Millymollymandy]

Goodo , and at least the beans inside the pods are protected so I'm sure you'll feel like eating them when they are ready, even if you don't fancy the shoots or the whole young pod!