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  • Killing cutworm

    I appear to have a cutworm problem in my potted strawberries. Can anybody offer any advice on how to get rid of the little bugs. Any means possible ie not necessarily organic cos I want them dead.
    thanks

  • #2
    Quoted from Square Foot Gardening by Mel Bartholomew...

    The plant looks like it was toppled by a miniature chainsaw - you'll find the cleanly severed top lying on intact on the ground...
    Luckily the cutworm eats through only one plant a night. It must get very sleepy after its big meal because it will always burrow into the soil right next to the toppled plant and sleep until the next night. Then it comes back up to the surface, crawls to the next plant and does its job again...

    To catch him, take a sharpened pencil and dig carefully in the soil around the toppled plant. You will only have to dig about half an inch deep. If you don't find the worm right away keep digging in concentric circles and just a little deeper until you spot it.


    When you find it - dispatch it immediately with a quick squeeze or put it on a path and step on it.

    I'd suggest digging around the plants it's killed so far and seeing if you can find it - otherwise I'd probably suggest going out tonight and trying to catch it before it gets to another plant. According to the references I have you'll lose a plant a night to each cutworm so acting quickly would be a smart move. Putting a newspaper collar around the remaining plants, pushed about 1.5 inches into the ground is meant to discourage them.

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