Getting Rid Of Japanese Beetles In Your Garden

FIY: The horticulturist here where I live said those traps need to be hung FAR away from your garden area, else you will cause those beetles to be attracted to your garden plants. He said to always be mindful where you are hanging them, (not too close to a neighbors garden)... that would cause someone else trouble.... but mainly, you don't want to put those traps in your garden area or anywhere near it. The idea is to lure the beetles AWAY from your garden and to end up in the bag. The attractant in the lure is Geranium oil.

I don’t understand why milky spore was not mentioned. It is fabulous for keeping down numbers. It also spreads naturally. I tend to reapply every few years to boost it, but it does work wonders!

Cut the bottom off the trap bag and put the trap over a 5 gallon bucket with water and a few drops of dish soap. Replace with another ready bucket as needed. Dump when bugs are fully deceased. Be diligent 3-4 years and you will break the cycle. Saved our trees and gardens when others were lost. Yes we absolutely attracted our neighbors beetles, thank God, because they did nothing but complain about my trapping. Ended their problem too. You’re welcome.

I had the same problem 20 years ago when the beetles first made it to southern Illinois. Our backyard was over the fence from a soybean field that the beetles just loved. Initial attempts to use the Spectricide bag traps of the day did not work well, because they filled up within an hour, resulting in them meeting up, mating and flying off. Also, the traps seemed to attract more beetles to the yard than were there before putting them up, so placing them far away from their favorite plants is a good strategy. Putting the trap over a 45-gallon trash drum filled part way with soapy water was an improvement. I would dump the barrel each evening and refill it. The skunks, opossums and rat snakes enjoyed the feast. What really did the trick was replacing the tiny bag with a tube of plastic bag material long enough to ensure that the beetles entering the trap would be guided to a watery demise. Just using a longer, large capacity bag worked wonders too. The bags had to weigh over 30 pounds each. They do stink though when caught in those quantities. You are correct that keeping their numbers down does help from year to year. One other thing I noticed is that it took the native birds a while to develop a taste for the beetles. The cardinals in particular seem to have developed a taste for them, and I often see them working their way through our vines to find them.

Japanese Beetle traps just add to the problem. I used them for a few years and just got more beetles. I don't use them anymore. I'm using Milky Spore. It works!

I have found that planting Buckwheat close to and within gardens so they are flowering early and all summer the buckwheat attracts beetle predators and the beetle population drop dramatically. More pollinators and birds are in the garden. Those look like very good traps, and they plan for a big 'harvest'.

Funny how I didn't know you have this problem in your country and it broke my heart and then saw someone did invent something to stop and manage it and it calmed me down. I wish your and the earth the best. ❤

I've had extensive discussion with our state extension agents about the traps and they are clear that the traps are not good for backyard use. They bring more beetles in. I've convinced my neighbors to not use them. We're having much better luck with 3X/year use of milky spore.

You are so right about seeing one or two one year and then a mass the next. I tend to let most critters live their little lives, but I finally let my young peach trees fruit this year and they decimated the fruit just before it was ripe enough to pick. They chewed right through the organza bags i had put on the fruits. I'm going to try these traps.

It may depend on where you live. My garden ( in southern Ontario Canada) had petunias and holes were eaten through the blooms, daily. I spent three hours a day through the entire season, and all my planters are full of those eggs. I’m slowly reclaiming the dirt and getting rid of the grubs.

They 🪲and the grubs make great fish bait 🐠🐟 We have birds here... Ibis I think... that have long beaks to get deep in the sandy soil and feast on the grubs..

Thank you, I tried the traps and they work great. I’m finding very few beetles in my garden now.👍🏻

Guinea warrior just doing work need more of them

Laying out a 2 foot grid of 2 ounces of Milky Spore really helps for up to 10 years

I live in town but have always had Japanese Beetle problems d/t my rose bushes. I let my neighbors put out those bags and attract the beetles to their properties:) I have put the grub killer in my grass for a couple years. This year I hardly saw any beetles on my flowers - at least partly because one day I noticed movement in my grass, went to check it out, and realized I was seeing beetles emerging from the ground! I got real busy killing them before they could get any further.

I have done a ton of research on whether or not to use traps. I copy and pasted this article I found... The University of Missouri and Lincoln University have found two things that are key to making the traps effective. What they say is that you must make sure you have a large container to trap the beetles in. The second important step is to not put it by the plants but instead, around the perimeter of the area you are trying to protect. You also want to make sure that the traps are spaced no further than 200 feet apart so that you have a continuous perimeter of the lure scent to attract the beetles. By placing them in a perimeter around your property it means that Japanese beetles emerging from the soil are attracted to the edge of your property instead of towards the plants you are trying to protect. Also, those flying in from neighboring properties are intercepted and trapped before they get to your plants. If you have a relatively small property, such as a regular city lot, with the 200 foot spacing you may only need one or two traps. You would place the traps on either end of your property and or the place farthest from the things you are trying to protect. Having a large container to hold the beetles that fall in the trap helps deal with the issue of them filling up too fast and makes it more feasible to empty the containers as needed. To read rest of article - https://www.givinggrove.org/blog-reference/guest-post-japanese-beetle

Thanks for the video. I'm here in San Diego. We have a fig tree that attracts the big green Japanese beetles. I will pick up the fallen figs and encourage people on the property to pick them off the tree. We also have hibiscus shrubs full of whitefly so I'm dealing with that too. Again, thanks for your video.

Look at how many you collect!!! 🐞 My gosh no wonder our raspberry plants were completely skeletonized!!!

I LOVE the beetle bags you have! Ours are different and they dont open at the bottom so we have to empty ours every other day and its stinky and messy but i am about to go buy some of your linked bags now! We have grape vines and a lot of hibiscus plants around our house and these bags have been a life saver! We have discarded hundreds and thousands of these beetles and they seem to fill to the brim every other day. Your video was very informative so thanks for all the research you've done and relayed to us in this vid! Oh, and we have to put them atleast 20 ft down wind of our grapes, flowers and trees and we just hang them on our fence but im going to get a hook like you have so i can place them exactly where i want! Tha ks!

Thank you for this video! I've been battling Japanese Beetles since we moved into our home a few years ago. The plants they seem to be most attracted to for me are our roses, hardy hibiscus, rose of sharon, black berries, raspberries, and marigolds. I purchased some traps like the ones in your video and they seem to work alright. I definitely still have to go around and get them off the plants myself. I might also try the grub killer this fall to see if that makes more of a difference. I also started my first veggie garden this year and have dealt with pretty much all of the "bad bugs" so it has been an exhausting experience just trying to manage pests without using a bunch of sprays and chemicals.