Cucumber Beetles have been as big a plaque for me as Japanese Bettles are in other gardens (we don't have them here yet Thank Goodness). The way they eat leaves the petals in shreds. Here is a picture of one on a rose petal. Note how the damage looks if they are left alone on the petal long enough. Not just a round hole, but rather they eat from top to bottom leaving a long slash in the petal. {{gwi:341791}}

I haven't seen any on the daylilies,but my roses has them.They get down in the bud and eat it up.

Jean

They were definitely here in Alabama this year. I only got to enjoy maybe half a bloom season before I realized what the culprit was and sprayed. By then it was too late. They would completely cover up an old bloom from day before and then they moved on to the fresh new blooms. The buds and blooms just dried up and dropped off. That is a good picture of the spotted cucumber beetle, Maryl. Next year I will be ready to take action before they destroy my garden. I found out they enter the soil to lay eggs and multiply and then come back in September with a new attack. So any reblooms are on the hit list. Ida

If you look in the lower left, you will see two of the SOB's just barely peeking out from under a petal. They appear off and on all through the year, but fall is their prime season. I'm not much on using insecticides, but when they appeared in massive plague numbers 3 years ago, I tried spot applications of different insecticides to see what would kill them. Nothing except Pyrethins totally killed them dead. The others just knocked them down for a few minutes, but then they recovered and flew back up to the blooms. I ended up not using any insecticide at all that year and just suffering the loss. Actually roses were their 2nd choice on the menu. My sunflowers, asters, single petaled mums were first choice so I could definitely see them liking the single petals of a daylily. Fortunately I don't have any daylilies in bloom in October/November.

Thanks for the replies! That's very helpful Maryl, I've never sprayed anything before but they may push me to it. Right now I knock them down into the throat of the flower and use my reverse action tweezers to get them back out.

Satisfying, but I kill alot more time than beetles. :)