What are these little black specks on the deformed blooms. I've been told they aren't thrips. Old blooms also are sometimes covered with these. Click on image.

mantisOH said:What are these little black specks on the deformed blooms. I've been told they aren't thrips. Old blooms also are sometimes covered with these. Click on image.

Earwigs. They eat the surface off the petals and poop all over them (the black specks).

Mantis,

I will second the diagnosis: Earwig Poop.

David

What do people do to control these things? They are worse than thrips in my garden. Thanks Sue and David for your clear diagnosis.

mantisOH said:What do people do to control these things? They are worse than thrips in my garden. Thanks Sue and David for your clear diagnosis.

In bad years I've carried a squirt bottle of insecticidal soap and zapped the earwig bottoms sticking out of the flowers early in the morning. I don't think it made much difference to the population but it made me feel better. I used to find they'd be all over Echinacea and Shasta daisy flowers at night under a porch light. I zapped a whole lot of those too. I've also tried diatomaceous earth in the daylily leaf bases which is where they hang out when not in the flowers. I'm not sure that helped a whole lot either. Some years there are just so many of them. other years they're not as bad.

Live head, Lowell....go out at dusk and pick off your blooms. You will find them hanging out in the throat of the bloom.....pick the bloom, fold it up, drop it in a bucket and let the bucket sit overnight....and those little buggers are gone, gone, gone. And you wake up to a nice, clean garden....win win!!!

I assume you mean a bucket of water with something in it that will kill them, Judy? Like soapy water, salty water...... If you just drop them in a bucket, or a bucket of plain water, they'll surely just climb out.

Maybe if they are folded up in the bloom they can't climb out?

Seedfork said:Maybe if they are folded up in the bloom they can't climb out?

I'd have thought if they could get in there they'd also be able to get out.

I second what Judy says! Someone told me years ago that if you take your blooms off at night, you drastically cut down the earwig population.

Mantis,

One year I had earwigs all over the place. I decided to live head and there was a great reduction of earwigs. Since that time, I have not had many issues with earwigs. Other suggestions involve laying 2 pieces cardboard in between the plants and the earwigs get in between the two pieces of cardboard and then you have the satisfaction of squishing them.

David