Hop Pests ID thread: Pics, descriptions and solutions

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I've grown up with them in wisconsin so that was an easy one for me. Hate them things cause they like to fly into you when you out relaxing.

Having grown up in Scotland but now living in Texas not sure I've ever seen one up close. Thanks again. I've gotten more into identifying my pests now. Think I've manage to spot some hop merchant caterpillars as well as a long-legged fly (which apparently eat other insects). You can find some pics on my hop growing blog.
 
Im having trouble with downy mildew on my peppers and im worried about it spreading to my hops. My hop bines are filled with cones and starting sidearm growth. Is there a fungicide(preferably organic) thats safe to use and wont ruin the cones I have going? Ive already lost my Beefsteak tomatoes to this damned plague mildew!!!

EDIT: Id rather use a systemic fungicide more so than a foliar spray.

Two things to mention here.

1) Peppers do not get downy mildew very often, are you sure it is downy mildew? When they do get powdery mildew however, it infects the underside of the leaf, making it look like downy mildew.

2) Regardless of what the disease is, neither mildew will transfer to hops, I mean there is ZERO chance of it. You could shake the spores from infected pepper leaves all over the hops and it would not make a difference. Hops downy mildew is caused by Psuedoperonospora humuli, which is only found on hops. Powdery mildew of hops is caused by Podosphera macularis, is only found on hops, strawberries, and maple trees. So no need to worry about cross contamination from your sick pepper plants.
 
I don't think it's powdery mildew and the weather I've been having fits the needs for downy to start. Only the undersides have been getting it but nothing ever on top. When I spray them off there's tiny black dots left behind underneath where the fungus was growing. And whatever it is it did start showing up on a few of my hops leaves. It just poured so I didnt see anything on my hops this time, hopefully it stay that way. I hate that stuff any leaf that has any bit of it dies the next day. Heres a few pics of what it did to my pepper plant...

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That is not fungus, those are insects! Likely some sort of wooly aphid, and the black dots you see are the dead bodies once the wax has been washed away by your spraying. Unlike fungi, most insects have a wide range of host plants.
 
theredben said:
That is not fungus, those are insects! Likely some sort of wooly aphid, and the black dots you see are the dead bodies once the wax has been washed away by your spraying. Unlike fungi, most insects have a wide range of host plants.

So you think the white fuzzy looking stuff isnt fungus? Because it definitely looked like it was. I looked online and it looked like downy. Any advice on ridding this white fuzz for good? And for keeping them off my hops?
 
Any oil-based product will work. Organocide seems popular, but insecticidal soap will work just as well. Sometimes just a hard blast with a hose will keep the numbers down to a manageable level.
 
So you think the white fuzzy looking stuff isnt fungus? Because it definitely looked like it was. I looked online and it looked like downy. Any advice on ridding this white fuzz for good? And for keeping them off my hops?

The fuzz may have been from wooly aphids; google image them. They would be kind of cool if they weren't trying to feast on my young.
 
I am a first time hop grower. I seem to be having a couple of problems, but I am having trouble identifying the cause of the problems. Early in the year I realized that a bunch of caterpillars were munchin' on my leaves, so I killed them off with Sevin. But now that they are gone, some is still eating my leaves and I am not sure what it is. Also, I have recently noticed that the leaves on one of my Nugget plants and turned brown and curling up. A couple have completely died. They have been getting plenty of water and I have fertilized them a couple of times with fish and seaweed emulsion. Any ideas as to what the cause is?? I've attached some pictures of each problem.

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bristela said:
Having grown up in Scotland but now living in Texas not sure I've ever seen one up close. Thanks again. I've gotten more into identifying my pests now. Think I've manage to spot some hop merchant caterpillars as well as a long-legged fly (which apparently eat other insects). You can find some pics on my hop growing blog.

Nice blog. The easiest way to tell the difference between the japanese beetle and june bug is the segmented body. In the pics you posted, you can see the japanese beetle has 3(head, shoulder and body). I don't know the scientific terms for it but I'm sure a quick google/bing search will let u know. In a few weeks ill be posting a lot about what pest I'm dealing with. Time to go get a book on bugs.
 
Ive been rather fortunate with deterring pests ao far this year. Had an evil caterpillar i threw to the birds but other than that its been fine...until this last week. Ive noticed little bits of damage but today i saw an unexpected culprit. A ladybug. Im concerned about using pesticides on my hops because they share a bed with ripening strawberries and a massive tomato bush. The pesticide i had originally used was supposed to be used just once yearly and not around harvest time. With a toddler picking berries as she pleases, i cant risk toxic berries. Has anyone tried using dish-soap and water as an all around spray? Maybe add a drop or two of tea tree oil? Ive got the patience to go spray everything down daily/ every other day. But i don't want to cause adverse effects to my sweet chinook and willamette. Especially for nothing. Thanks for any advice.
Salute,
Hopmomma
 
Lady bugs are good they eat mites and other stuff. I used 1 tbsp of liquid dish soap + 1 tsp vegetable oil mixed in 1 Qt of water as a foliar spray on all my plants until my peppers and hops needed some extra back up. Thats when I got some Oganicide from home depot as advised by others on here. Its safe to use up to the day of harvest. But the soap mixture works just fine on my strawberries.
 
KeyWestBrewing said:
Lady bugs are good they eat mites and other stuff. I used 1 tbsp of liquid dish soap + 1 tsp vegetable oil mixed in 1 Qt of water as a foliar spray on all my plants until my peppers and hops needed some extra back up. Thats when I got some Oganicide from home depot as advised by others on here. Its safe to use up to the day of harvest. But the soap mixture works just fine on my strawberries.

This lady bug was actually eating the leaf. I couldnt believe it. I will try your recipe. Thanks much!
 
My bi-daily check revealed hundreds of these on my tomatoes and a few on my hops. Must of had a massive hatching or something cause I hadn't seen any so far this year. Little green sap sucking aphids. Hit everything in the garden with organocide. First time in a couple weeks. I've also been seeing what I think are hop fleas. Little black jumping bastards always spotted near damaged leaves. Hopefully the Organocide clogs all there little lungs and they suffocate quickly. They look and seem to be flea beatles.

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hopmomma said:
This lady bug was actually eating the leaf. I couldnt believe it. I will try your recipe. Thanks much!

That doesn't sound right at all. Is the "ladybug" actually red or an orangish red? I only ask cause ladybugs don't eat plants when they don't have aphids and other bugs to dine on. There's an actual beetle that looks like a ladybug but its shell isn't the bright red a ladybug has and if u look closely it really has a head the sticks out of the body.

After a quick search there's one type of beetle related to the ladybug that does eat plants. Its called a 28 spot ladybug. I didn't look up pics but assuming by name its more of a speckled looking ladybug.
 
phatspade said:
That doesn't sound right at all. Is the "ladybug" actually red or an orangish red? I only ask cause ladybugs don't eat plants when they don't have aphids and other bugs to dine on. There's an actual beetle that looks like a ladybug but its shell isn't the bright red a ladybug has and if u look closely it really has a head the sticks out of the body.

After a quick search there's one type of beetle related to the ladybug that does eat plants. Its called a 28 spot ladybug. I didn't look up pics but assuming by name its more of a speckled looking ladybug.

It was definately a lady bug. I dot have any aphids around here. Do have spider mites now so I've been spraying the leaves with a soapy miture until I can grab some organcide. I looked around at images and information about lady bugs and it wasn't a jap beetle. Haven't seen anymore since I have begun spraying.
 
That just blows my mind since a lot of us know lady bugs as a friendly bug. Let's hope they don't come back.
 
I'm still convinced its not a lady bug. Growers of all sorts release lady bugs by the hundreds intentionally on there plants. If lady bugs did any damage this practice would be long gone by now. Either you have a blood thirsty, hateful, beastly, outright evil and diabolical, rogue lady bug. Or it's one of the 1000 some odd insects that attack growers plants around the globe.
 
Nice blog. The easiest way to tell the difference between the japanese beetle and june bug is the segmented body. In the pics you posted, you can see the japanese beetle has 3(head, shoulder and body). I don't know the scientific terms for it but I'm sure a quick google/bing search will let u know. In a few weeks ill be posting a lot about what pest I'm dealing with. Time to go get a book on bugs.

Thanks for visiting the blog :) I've been enjoying trying to id the bugs I find. Found this guy on a tomato plant right beside my hops. Hope it doesn't move over. After some reading up it seems that this is a tobacco hornworm, despite it being on a tomato plant particularly when there is also something called a tomato hornworm :) They're very similar. The tomato version apparently has V shapes up its side rather than just stripes like this one has. Also the tail (or horn) at the back is red on tobacco ones and black on the tomato variety.

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That is indeed a horn worm. They hide in the inner parts of the plant in the day but come out during sunrise and sunset to chomp your prized plants.

Thanks for the confirmation. I'm just hoping that it contents itself with the tomato plant. Fortunately hops don't really have interiors so with any luck it won't be able to hide very well on it.
 
Thanks for the confirmation. I'm just hoping that it contents itself with the tomato plant. Fortunately hops don't really have interiors so with any luck it won't be able to hide very well on it.

If you ever see that thing with little white eggs on it, do not remove it from your plants. These are wasp eggs and they will hatch and eat the hornworm and discourage others from coming back onto your plants. If you remove it they will eventually come back. It gets pretty nasty (and pretty cool) when the wasp larva start eating it.
 
Mites Suck! Literally. Here's a couple pichers of what I found today whilst out watering the girls growing up the chimney. FIRST: Healthy leaves on top and damaged on bottom. SECOND: Closer look at minor damage compared to healthy leaves. THIRD: Usually starts off with what they (the bug peoples) call a 'bronzing' and FOURTH: Eventually progresses to a bleached appearance. Nothin' that a few Smuttynose IPA's can't take care of!!

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If you ever see that thing with little white eggs on it, do not remove it from your plants. These are wasp eggs and they will hatch and eat the hornworm and discourage others from coming back onto your plants. If you remove it they will eventually come back. It gets pretty nasty (and pretty cool) when the wasp larva start eating it.

If you dont see those eggs, kill it immediately. They will decimate half a tomato plant in a day. Also, Ive never seen just one. Check those 'maters everyday for a week for its bros.
 
A 50/50 rubbing alcohol and water mixture works great on mites. It kills them on contact and won't hurt your plants. Just spray em down for a few days in a row, this worked for me like a month ago. Since, I've been spraying weekly with organicide and I haven't been having any more pest problems. Make sure to check the bottom leaves since they start low and spread up. They also infest quickly so kill them now before they ruin your precious harvest.... Good luck!!!
 
Thanks man, but I'll stick to the IPA. It's been about 1000F for the last month or so and I don't care what happens. My day job dictates that I work out in the 1000F weather so when I get home I like to be comfortable. I know it's not fair to the hops but it's only occurring on the one that's growing near the heat source (chimney). Actually, these are only ornamental/cooling devices that I planted on the South side to help shade the house ~ humulothermal cooling. All the others are A-OK, but thanks for the tip!
 
Can anybody identify this little sucker? Been finding quite a few on both my plants starting a week or so ago. The ladybug population has also seemed to have decreased recently as well. :(

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Hi all. I just found some damage from a boring bug. The affected plant is Chinook and only one of the vines was damaged. From the entry point upward, the whole vine is shriveled and below is fine. As you can see, they throw out pretty long sidearms. Quite a few years ago I had a very similar problem and after 4 years of detective work found it to be European Corn Borer. This may or may not be the problem as we have no suspects at this time.

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That could have given whatever got inside the vine an easy entry point but the entire pith between nodes was tunneled out. Real similar to what happened in the past. I'll keep an eye out.
 
hey guys found a couple spiders on my hops, and one even has a nest. Not sure if they are mites or not, and one leaf seems to have a some sort of white mold unsure if related. any suggestions?

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Also have some bugs im curious about.

I live near a wetland/marsh area across the street so there's a whole host of bugs...but these always seem to be around my garden.

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