Last year during my tomato fiasco where 99.99999999999999999% of my tomatoes rotted due to some type of bacterial infection(?) during our hot and very wet summer, I also had a heavy infestation of stinkbugs on the tomato plants.

I'd like to get ahead of the 8 ball on these this year. Has anybody got thoughts on controlling them? So far it seems like little is out there to combat them short of a flamethrower. <sigh>

I've seen mention of using a soapy water spray on them....they kind of seem hard-bodied to me, but maybe the nymphs would be killed by this?

I've also seen some Rescue brand of traps that have so-so reviews...some people swear by them some people swear at'em. :shrug:

It will be a bit different for the garden this year being as we had LOTS of privet hedge and other brush cleared from around the house last autumn. I'm thinking that this got rid of lots of things (probably good and bad ) that were using those bushes for nesting and overwintering areas. There are still trees and a couple of hundred feet away still an overgrown fence row. Several hundred feet to the east and north is a pine forest. So, really, there is ample area for them to come from. I hate to invest in snake-oil, but I'm seriously thinking of buying a couple of the Rescue traps. I've got a large field pine to the northeast of the garden probably 50' away that I could attach one to and a young pear tree (5-6 year old?) at the southeast corner I could hang one against.

Those are grasping-for-straw ideas. So, anybody got some thoughts on battling these juice suckers????
Thanks!!!
Ed

ETA: Placing the traps on the trees would be before the tomatoes start producing. If the stinkbugs get a foothold in the tomatoes then I'd move the traps into the garden. Naturally, if no stinkbugs are getting into the traps I'd move them to a different location anyhow. But, there again, these traps have mixed reviews to start with.

Howdy Ed 😀
I've, heard, that Neem oil is systemic, by a few different members. Maybe one will read your question and tell us how best to apply : As a spray or drench, and how often ?
I searched the net last year, and found no answers. The bottle of Neem oil gave no direction either.

I know the nymphs are susceptible to pesticides, adults are not.
Problem is getting spray on all the nymphs.

😎😎😎

Ooookay. Alabama. Didnt see your tomatoes last year, but they do rot when stinkbugs suck the juice out of them. We have stinkbugs all year- I find huge 1" across stinkers hiding in the liriope in the Spring. Stinkbugs have 8 instars of growth. 8 different forms of their stink pheremone that draws other stinkers to that squashed one.
Neem oil is a 'fungicide'. You mix it with HOT water and a drop or two of Dawn type soap. ( A low sudsing soap additive is considered a 'sticker' helping the product stick to a plant to do its job.) It does provide relief from aphids etc, but we wash it off after use so it doesnt affect the plant as a systemic. I have seen it burn a plant if the sun is too hot when you spray it..
For handpicking bugs a simple bowl of soapy dawn water will kill bugs. Stinkbugs are drawn to certain colors. That of sunflowers, ripe maters and that beautiful robins egg blue my 18 wheeler once was. Shrug, no clue why that blue- may have just been the heat on a cool day. Tomatoes need 3' of space between them. An 'indeterminate' means a possible height of 12+' by seasons end. Open pollinated means they will grab pollen from everywhere, so protect the blooms if you save seed. I am NOT up on my diseases, I do use Neem oil, Sevin dust, or even self rising flour to dust with. This IS war.
My heirloom, indeterminate, open pollinated Prudens Purple tomato. A potato leaf variety that I have no clue what that curl is about. I started the seeds on Jan 20th, and I hope the stinkers dont win

There's one thing I didn't mention about stink bugs.
The stink bugs don't, per-say, do any damage to plants. It's the blight disease they carry, that kills the plant. There is no cure for blight.

One member said, baking soda water spray, seems to slow down blight. Another member said that peroxide water spray, seemed to slow it down.

I'm going to do susesive planting this year, since it seems to me, that the stink bugs are attracted to plants that are just starting to produce .

Ttfn
😎😎😎

P.S.
Kat ! Have you read the whole label on Neem oil ?

Several times, but not in the last 3 yrs. Phil, the shield bug, or stinkbugs, DO suck the fruit. Or pierce it anyway, very visible.

Kat : Howdy 😀
I got my garden notebook out. To look up thr formula to spray for Blight for you.
Hear it is :
To one gallon of water, add 3Tbl baking soda, 1 Tbl vegetable oil, and 2 drops dish soap (dawn original).

With my notebook out. I read, the very vague ! Instructions for Neem oil. Theres no need to add any dishsoap to it. It already has a "spreader" in it. Adding soap to it could be why it burns your plants.

Have a wonderful day 👍
Philip 😎😎😎

Philip- I live in a very high rainfall area. That formula is one we use to fight black mold on our citrus. The soap helps kill aphids which are hard to poison. It isnt why the plants burn- that is from spraying at the wrong time of day. My neem oil may be different than the one you have chosen. Spreader sticker I became accustomed to applying nearly 50 yrs ago as a teenager at my grandfathers side.
Exerpt from ' A Field Guide to Texas Critturs' by Bill Zac. I believe I read Texas has at 5 var of stinkbugs and only 1 is beneficial.

Ummm, book also indicates that the author has the best luck in his garden with a pyrethrins spray- can be washed off and fruit eaten same day.

Howdy Kat 😀
I'm allmost a Texan ! Sort of 🤔 ??? My dad was born and raised in Rosebud, Texas. Does that count ? 😀😀😀.

So, do you use pyrethrum for stink bugs ?
I read it's really the only effective method to kill them.
Variety of stink bugs I get fly.
To hand pick is nearly impossible. There so alert and fast to fly away.

I read that you can trap them overnight, by hanging a damp towel over a lawn chair in the evening. Then, in early morning, go out and collect them.

Have you ever used " "Surround" it's a food grade kaolin clay. You mix with water and spray. After a couple or so sprays, it's suppose to make plants so slick, that bugs can't hold on to plants.

Residue also shades plants from the intense, wilting heat of the sun.

Hope to hear back from you soon. 👍
😎😎😎

Sun is not my gardens problem. I havent used pyrethins since before I came here, but wasnt gardening. The book is dated- I read malathion for one issue, but know it hasnt been on the shelf in many years. I used it on southern army worms trying to take down a 50' pecan...no kaolin use. At this mooment I have no poisons other than 'Knock Out' on the fire ant mounds.








We live on the edge of The Bug Thicket, so I am watching and pretending I retired just to experiment with different ideas, chuckl. The middle pic is at 430pm cdt- last pic is our last rain a few days back

Kat : If you're wanting to go organic, with fire ants. @green told me, to pour a packet of Splenda on fire ant hole, to get rid of them.

Also ! After you dump packet of Splenda on mound !
To run like the devil was after you !!!
Because the ants will be !😮!!!
😎😎😎

Hadn't heard of the Splenda trick... only most of my fire ants don't make a true mound. they just spread out over the whole surface in tiny networks. They grow so fast the queens barely move out before it looks like, well, San Francisco and all its suburbs and surrounding towns... I will let ya know if they love the Splenda better than I do...

I don't think I explained myself well with the fire ants. There's, our native, fire ants, sounds like what you have.
Then the imported fire ants, that make big tall mounds of soil above the ground.
The single packet of Splenda is suppose to work for the imported fire ants. I've never tried it on our domestic fire ants. It may work ?🤔???
For any of our domestic ants, I buy a 5 pound bag of regular corn meal or grits, and sprinkle/broadcast over hole garden area, plus 10 foot perimeter. Ants take it to Burrough and they all feed on it. They can't digest it, and perish.
It can take a few weeks. I do it ownce in spring, and usually don't have anymore ants till the next year.
Spott treatments don't seam to work.

Ta ta 😀
😎😎😎

No native fire ants, all of em moved in from Mexico here. Sandy loam so they dont have to mound, tho there are a few mounds...am told early treatment with dried molasses works too, but they move back in to the same spots after awhile. Its just really wild woods here.

Hi, Kat 😀 !

Have you called the, USDA ? To come check them ???
There trying there best to stop the, African imported fire ants, from establishing a foothold, in the U.S.A.
👍

😎😎😎

We are in Texas, they have been here for years. Their mounds have been spotted 80' down in caves. we do try to stop them...by an amazing amount of means. Seems they are bumping into colder regions before they die... they arent the only type of ants we have, by any means. Like the killer bees... if you have fire ants, you dont have moles and vice versa...

Philip, I tried some Splenda on the fire ants around here and the reaction was amazing....thousands and thousands of ants exited the mound holding up tiny glasses of unsweetened tea towards me.

I guess it's because they're southern ants....

I'll look for some organic (no additives) pyrethrum and use it for spot treatments. I might even look up some Surround. I know that last year they were terrible...lots of them from tiny to armored-sized.

Fireants...the ones around here are usually referred to as "Argentine fireants". They supposedly arrived in Mobile, Alabama, some 65 years ago via a cargo ship. They can have all forms of nests...beneath boards, grass level hills of a grayish, organic looking construction, or the large mounds that can be both red signifying building tunnels in red clay or more grayish from building the tunnels in a soil with higher organic content. Down here you had better be careful if you move anything in warm weather. I had left some stakes inside the garden fence over the winter.at the edge of the garden and when I picked them up yesterday the ants had build a nursery beneath them.

The nests that will blind-side you are the grass level ones or the ones built into an unsuspicious item...not much of a sign of ants with them. A county or two over from me we had a young lady die from fire ant bites a few years ago....had sat down on some hay bales where the ants had built a nest. She was allergic to them. Sad story.

There are 2 things I know of that work on protecting your crops from stink bugs. For me is hanging praying mantis eggs out in spring works well. You can buy them on ebay and every year I get about 20 eggs to help build up my population. Second is another thing I found on ebay. https://www.ebay.com/itm/Garde...
they take a while to come in from China but do the trick. You can buy the larger size and cover whole limbs with multiple fruits or veggies on them. Stink bugs are bad here but have slowed down a good bit in recent years. We don't spray anything here and our wheelbug and predatory stinkbug populations are on the rise and they both eat stink bugs too.

I'm all for not spraying, but the stinkbugs were bad, bad, bad last year. I felt bad spraying soapy water last year for aphids on my peas. I think the bags wouldn't work out for me...I'd procrastinate and the stinkbug nymphs and other stages already be established. I like the idea of praying mantis. Is there a danger in importing them from China??? Or, are our current ones actually from China? I don't want to imperil any native species with a foreign cousin.

I am optimistic that this year won't be as wet and soggy as last year was. Hopefully it won't dry out to the point of being a bad drought but maybe it'll be a good year. I do believe that the high rainfall we had contributed to a bumper crop of disease *and* insects. One thing is for sure...it's either going to rain or it won't rain. And as I always say...rain or shine, it beats no weather at all!!!!

Looks like storms tonight, a short day or so break, then starting Friday and continuing into next week rain and t-storms.<sigh> Maybe I can get something done late this afternoon before the rains come in.