Good Bugs Are Back in the Vineyard !

Working through the vineyard during the growing season allows one to see lots of critters. Yesterday as we were shoot positioning the chenin blanc vines we came across a small cluster of red aphid looking insects on a tendril. We always take a good photo of what we are looking at before we do anything with them. In this case these were spined soldier beetle nymphs which grow to be good predators for bad bugs so we let them alone. The way in which we could tell what these are spined soldier beetles is by the spiked egg cases you see in the photo. Kind of geeky for those of us vineyard workers but we enjoy seeing life in the vineyard.
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Thanks and also timely. Just came in from my vineyard to refill my coffee and saw this. Now I need to double check those “aphids” that I saw earlier just to make sure.

Every year we find something new, or, we find an insect we’re familiar with at a different development stage which makes it “new” to us. When we can’t identify it immediately we mark the spot with fluorescent tape then do the research and then decide if it can stay or needs to be removed from the vineyard. The insect world is pretty wild and bizarre.

Good bug reinforcements on the way! These are what the eggs look like for the spined soldier beetle before hatching. These were found today one row over from the chenin blanc row we were working yesterday.
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On the next row over in the chenin block there were more good guy’s eggs getting ready to hatch. This time they were ladybug eggs.
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Great pics! I’m always happy to find lady bugs in my garden.

Yet more reinforcements for the good bugs. These are the ladybug larvae that recently hatched on one of our chenin blanc plants. Alien looking things that eat their egg cases just after hatching…built in nutrition.
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Very cool!

Well it was bound to happen. Bad bugs are around as well. These are unhatched cutworm eggs but you can tell some are ready to hatch as they darken in color. As the name implies they hatch and feed on green stuff until a large size at which point they can encircle a shoot and cut it off. These guys participate in our bad bug relocation package.
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Master gardener training tells one to follow the poop to find vegetative eating pests. I noticed these little droppings while working the chardonnay vines yesterday.
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When I see small barrel shaped feces, and a bit of leaf damage, I know there is a “bad bug” culprit nearby. In this case it was the yellow woollybear caterpillar. It received the same relocation package as other “bad bugs”.
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Fun thread! You’ve got a lot of diversity in that vineyard.

I recently learned that lacewings are beneficial. Don’t judge a book by its cover!

Gary, can you elaborate on the “bad bug” relocation process? Also where is your vineyard located at?

Hi Hank - For bad bugs it really depends on what it is. Voracious eaters(e.g. tomato hornworm) or mass population(e.g. eggs) we “off them” or take them far out of the vineyard. Like the cutworm eggs I moved those to a compost pile quite far away. If it is something in a low population and that can’t do much damage or has limited life cycles we let them be. We do monitor for grape berry moths near the forest edge around our vineyard just after the wild grapes have flowered. They can, and have done, major damage to our crop. We also keep track of the leaf hoppers as they seem to like dense canopies so we shoot thin and position frequently to keep the air flow moving. Right now we have been going through the chardonnay to improve the canopy airflow and I’m seeing small leafhoppers but I’m also seeing masses of dragonflies following us around to gobble them up. The bird life and in particular the flycatchers are taking care of a lot of insects as well. If we do not know if the insect is “good or bad” we mark the vineyard location and take pictures to do the identification back home or contact our insect guru at UConn Extension before we do anything with them. The one insect we are most worried about right now is the spotted lanternfly. Have not seen one yet but we know it’s probably likely we will in the next few years. Our vineyard is located in the southeastern part of CT not far from Long Island Sound.

Gary, any issue with Japanese Beetles up your way? These are my biggest issue every year and I don’t have a good approach to them. Been hand picking in the morning to keep damage down and I don’t want to resort to carbaryl.

Good morning Brian. When the Japanese beetles do emerge from the soil the numbers have been small to moderate in number. The plants this year have grown faster than previous years so the Japanese beetles would help in the hedging. Have not seen any yet as the insect life seems slow this year to get going. In most years the birds seem to eat a fair share of the beetles when they do emerge as judged from the shiny poop on grape leaves. For the smaller new plants we knock them off into soapy water during the day. As you know for any farmer you have to decide when the insect pressure is so high to cause significant crop damage. We have been fortunate for the most part to have an eco-balance going on and most things seem to regulate each other hence the good bug - bad bug stand off. If you can stay away from carbaryl that’s a good thing.

Thanks Gary. I have the only (and small) vineyard in the area so as grapes are a trap crop, I get more than my fair share. In the past I have left excess canopy but I also have downy pressure and the extra growth made that worse and the trade off wasn’t worth it. And my birds don’t eat them. So I guess I will just keep picking for now and monitoring. With smaller plants spaced 3 x 3 it doesn’t take too much before the damage gets a bit concerning.

Unrelated. Yesterday I saw an assassin bug eating a lady bug. I hate when my good bugs eat other good bugs.

LOL trap crop! Good bugs eating good bugs happens but hopefully it stays rare. I have heard of some growers with small vineyards using a hand held vac to suck in Japanese beetles. However, in my experience any commotion nearby causes the beetles to roll off the leaves. Knowing that the soapy water thing works well when you can hold it below the leaf they are hanging onto. I have also noticed that those beetles that are doing the “wild thing” seem to be oblivious to what’s going on. Here’s my spouse’s take on Japanese beetles … EnoViti: Beetlejuice .

Have not seen many Japanese beetles so far this year and there are a only a few Asian beetles which are always in low numbers. The birds(flycatchers, robins, flickers, bluebirds, bluejays, swallows, catbirds, etc.) are prowling the vineyard in big numbers.

Yesterday while working in one of the chenin block rows my spouse found the following good guy eggs on a chenin shoot. These are green lacewing eggs. They are usually deposited near possible “soft bodied” insect food sources as the larvae are voracious eaters of bad guys. Difficult to photograph as the white eggs on the stalk are difficult to get any definition in them with a darker background.
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Fun thread Gary. Learning a lot

Still shoot positioning and thinning the head region of our chenin block. Work like this always brings you up front and personal with insects. This morning we ran into another good guy that my spouse discussed on her blog 2 years ago. Let me introduce the potter wasp. This ingenious wasp makes a two chambered pot with her mandibles and a cement mix. In one chamber is her egg and in the other is a paralyzed prey that becomes food for the hatched wasp larvae. Pretty cool ! Here’s my spouse’s write up from 2 years ago and easy reading references… EnoViti: Pottery on a Petiole .