black fly invasion on my runners

[weeclop]

i have been away on holiday for 10 days leaving my kind neighbours to water my plants but have returned to find my runners covered with black fly. there is ladybirds on the plant eating as much as the can but the flowers and leaves are covered.if i leave them will they do harm to my beans,or if i spray them with soapy water will this harm the ladybirds. i have no idea what to do so any advice will be appreciated
thanks weeclop

[Two_Sheds]

Squish them with your fingers.

[rustylady]

And try not to squish the ladybirds.

[northepaul]

I use a combination of squishing and spraying with garlic spray, which they dont like. Keep it up for a few days and see the difference in the plants. (Had terrible blackfly on my courgettes and pumpkin.)

[Mrs Dobby]

Spray them with organic washing up liquid diluted in water, they really dont like it at all!

Another thing we've noticed is that the bed of broadies that has self sown celery in it hasnt got a single blackfly on it, whereas the other bed (10' away) that doesnt have any celery in had a lot, until we sprayed them!

[gojiberry]

Blackfly on runners seems to be a problem this year and yet there was very little on the broad beans. May be down to the weird weather we have been having this year.

Ian

[JJSH]

I've got them on my broad beans, and thought the ladybirds were sorting it by munching through them, but I don't think they can eat them fast enough!

What is the risk if I leave them to it ~ will I just get a reduced crop, or are the results much more severe?

[snakeshack]

I bunged in some calendula seedlings from a neighbour on the lottie as she had lots of selfsown seedlings from last year.
I've had no blackfly on my beans this year either french or runners wheras most others,those who look down on flower growers, have a pukka infestation.
I don't think its a coincidence as my neighbour is fly free too.
the ladybird population this year is huge too so maybe it will balance out later.

[Shadylane]

I have calendula all over (and nasturtiums near the beans) and I've still got loads of black fly I was squishing them on the bored beans but I had to spray with washing up liquid as some parts ie the flowers are too delicate/fiddly to squish. I then nearly sprayed a ladybird. There's a few on there doing their best but I suppose they can only eat so much. So what do you do? Leave them and hope the ladybirds do their thing or give them a hand. Such a dilema. The runners are also getting attacked and I didn't have a problem last year. At home they're moving from the nasturtiums on to the cukes. I'm not growing nasturtiums again as they aren't helping at all and I reckon they're actually making it worse. So much for companion planting grr.