That is a good read;

For those willing to use a bit of Sevin carefully, you can keep the lower area coated to kill them off. Also a bit carefully placed on a few leaves 3 or 4 times in a season should pretty well knock out cuke and similar beetles.

Tom, thanks for the link. I really appreciated it & bookmarked the web site. Seems, are a glance, to be an excellent resource.

George
Tahlequah, OK

Thanks from here too, have done most suggestions, even wrapping the root/vine with foil, but his idea of laying down foil under the emerging vine sounds interesting.

I doubt that will work here. I religiously killed every larva for two years running, and I am still at square one. I placed aluminum under Costata Romanesca, it got 5 borers per plant instead of 12 for nearby Gold Rush. I sprayed Sevin on the base, and got one or two per plant. Tromboncino (similar to Zucchetta) and butternut are the solution for me.

glib I think the fellow meant about the aluminum that it would take a few years the first year,the one's in the ground will come up and bore in.I think he meant this would keep anymore moths from getting to the ground by confusing them on where the ground was.That said I agree with you and the document writer about just growing something else like butternut or I like the succession planting,he mentioned, and just ripping em up all summer and fall and discarding.I got the room and all I really need is one plant at a time producing..

I was considering a hydroponic approach. Small quantities mind you, but I was considering basically an earthbox using perlite instead of soil and then making a insect net cover. The down side of course being hand pollinating.

The aluminum is supposed to "dazzle" the moth. Never tried it.

He's right about slitting stems & injecting- I've found that surgery just beats up the plant. No mounding of soil is gonna help a cut stem at the base of the plant. And if the worm is of a good size and you inject BT or BNs, when it dies inside the stem it rots the stem out, making a gooey, stinky mess. And kills the plant anyway.

But the idea of systematically disrupting the reproductive cycles & thereby reducing local SVB numbers over time- that's very good. (If you're the only garden around!)

Some studies say you can kill up to 90% of the pupa over wintering in the soil by tilling.
I till to get sheet compost in the soil, so I get this benefit for free.
It seems to work, that & only one neighbor with in 10 acres of my garden. I do not want to use the sevin because of bees.

A good link... but I can't say I agree with all of the author's conclusions.

Concur with the recommendation for "Zucchetta rampicante" (a.k.a. "Tromboncino") as a zucchini substitute. Not only borer resistant, but less disease prone. Borers still try, I see some frass near the base sometimes... but the plant seems to kill or drive them off somehow, a couple weeks later there's no sign & the stems have healed.

I disagree, though, that rotation & row covers are ineffective. Without those methods (and tilling in Fall and/or Spring) I could not raise C. maxima or C. pepo squash here. Usually a total loss if not protected. With rotation & row cover, nearly 100% successful.

This won't work for everyone, though. In my location, I am able to cover the plants through the SVB egg laying period (and the first hatch of squash bugs as well). By the time the vines begin flowering & the cover needs to be removed, there are no signs of infestation for the rest of the year. Gardeners in areas with longer seasons have told me this is less effective for them.

Succession planting of zucchini is a novel approach to the problem... kind of a gardener's equivalent to the "human wave" style of warfare. It overwhelms the bugs by sheer force. But it also takes up a lot of space which could otherwise be devoted to other vegetables.

jolj,

I suppose using some Sevin conjures up dousing the plants in most people's mind. I mean some very careful application. Bees are interested in the blossoms only and I am not talking about dousing the blossoms!!