"Sluggo Plus" is supposed to be good for them. I haven't actually tried it yet, but ordered some last week which should be arriving today. The product isn't carried at any stores near me, so I had to order online. I found the manufacturers website to have the best price. Note that the original "Sluggo" is just for slugs & snails, you need the "Plus" which has spinosad in it.

Pillbugs definitely eat seedlings and in my garden will even eat leaves on some mature plants, especially eggplants.

http://www.montereylawngarden.com/products/organic/

In small numbers, pillbugs won't generally attack crops. But when you get a pillbug "boom", they'll eat whatever they can get their mandibles on.

I was planting marigolds in amongst some tomatoes that have been in my garden for a while now. These plants had pine straw all around underneath them. when moving aside the straw, I saw a WHOLE bunch of them. Can they harm tom's?

I cant see any benefit (or dont know of any) that they have, so if there is ANY actual benefit to them? please let me know, otherwise, I'll be on my way to get some sluggo :)

pill bugs are organic matter eaters. Generally they are 'good guys' helping to process the organic matter in the garden/soil.

often they are mistaken as pests when spotted eating something dead/dying/rotting due to other causes.

Some report that in large numbers they may sample living plants.

As a rule, if your plants aren't getting munched, they don't need to be controlled. I have many of them in my yard/garden and they cause no problems I can detect.

Ortho Bug Getta Plus is a slug and snail bait that also contains sevin so it attracts and kills cutworms and pill bugs too. You want to be careful with it because it is sweet smelling and will attract/poison dogs, birds and children too. I find that if used after a rain while the bugs are active it kills most of them in a day or two and can then be dissolved with a hose. You can also put the baits under cover like under boards, or under mulch.

rjinga, i say, kill them all.

for others who believe that pill bugs are harmless, you are wrong. first of all, even if they eat dead leaves, what is so good about that? because dead leaves can be turned into compost. but if pill bugs eat them, they don't produce anything beneficial at all.

those evil pill bugs eat a lot of things. they don't eat everything, such as basil. but they have preference for particular vegetables. they sometimes don't eat the leaves, instead they eat the stems, cut those things into half. once the top is gone, the plant can't grow any more no matter how strong the stem is.

such as, Amaranth, sometimes, they have like 5, 6 leaves already, yet pill bugs will eat the stem. and kill the veges like that.

i have observed them late at night. the big mature pill bugs are too big to climb on those vegetable seedlings. i have seen their tiny youngsters eating the stems. i thought that i have cut worms in my backyard, but i have never seen one before. so it is obviously pill bugs are the evil bugs that are destroying a lot of my young veges. just during the last few days, they ate my tomato stems, practically killed two tomato seedlings.

i spent so many hours trying to hand pick them and drown them in a bottle of water. that is so time consuming. i definitely try to buy some product to kill them all.

The water trap described in that link is still pretty good. I tried that one to control an ant problem and it work pretty well. The ants instead of going on my sunflowers went to the dish of sugar water and drowned I also caught about a dozen Japanese beetles, they come out night, but would see the beetles in the water trap the following morning.

Uh, earthworms eat stuff too, and that's how it becomes compost.

Someone evidently started a myth that pill bugs (Roly Polys) only eat decayed matter and are beneficial, and it keeps getting repeated. I can say from personal observation that is bull. I have seen masses of them devouring tender seedling leaves, and they also eat any fruit that touches the ground like strawberries or tomatoes. Snail killer granules will kill them.

Sowbugs, often confused with pillbugs because they look so similar (but sowbugs don't curl up), will eat tender young leaves from seedlings. I have only pillbugs in my garden, and they don't bother my growing plants at all.

IIRC, the controls for the two insects are the same.

Here is a link that might be useful: Pillbugs, sowbugs, & roly polys

> dead leaves can be turned into compost. but if pill
> bugs eat them, they don't produce anything beneficial
> at all.

I would think bug poop would highly beneficial in the soil. But I agree that pillbugs can be deadly to young, tender plants.

Roly-polies most certainly eat plants. Not just dying or decaying plants either.They will munch on any healthy leaves, seedling and fruit they can get to.

I have a large population of them in the compost and mulch around my plants and have wondered recently if I have brought the problem on by supplying large amounts of organic matter for them (compost and leaves). They have a population explosion feeding on copious amounts of this organic matter and then move on to my plants to sustain that population. I've noticed the problem being a million times worse ever since I have been using compost as mulch, yet the "bare" beds where I don't pile on compost and leaves only have a couple of roly-polies and do not get chewed.

Is there anyone who can tell me if my theory has truth behind it? Are the compost and leaves I use on the beds making the problem worse?

hamiltongardener, yes, you are right.

kill them all. they are really pest. i have the same problem. i like to spread dead leaves on top of the soil. instead of becoming compost, they are eaten by pill bugs. and the bugs like to hide under the moisture mulch.

so what you are doing is really to help them to grow faster and better.

Anney, pill bugs do eat young plants. i have seen them in action, and they roll into balls. so they are not sowbugs.

however, pill bugs don't eat every young plants. they certainly don't like basil, but they eat cilantro.