Comp

That's a good idea. Especially if you've got some good place to dump the
bucket. I saw something a guy had done, that is similar to my idea and yours
combined. He made a funnel from a 2 liter bottle, and joined it with
another bottle with some sort of permanent joint. At the end of the day, he
filled the bottom bottle with soapy water, and then dumped it the next day
before he put the unit back up. In my patent searching, I found a patent on
a trap that would be placed in a small pond. When the beetles drop, the
fish eat them.

As far as spraying is concerned, I would say that Mopar is correct.
However, I found that I needed to spray so often that I had trouble keeping
up. His reference also from the University of Arkansas also makes that
point. If I read it correctly, you will need to be spraying every 2 or
three days. There is no doubt that spraying can be effective and a good
choice, especially for a tree like you have that is not fruit bearing, and
if you are able to reach the higher branches with your sprayer. What I
found though, was that spraying was more expensive, and more difficult to do
frequently enough to keep the beetles at bay. I have used both malathion
and sevin, and I don't remember seeing a big difference. But then again, I
didn't spray often enough. On that choice I would have to defer to Mopar's
reccomendation.

Good luck with whatever solution you use. I found the traps were the best
for my situation. I wrote a bunch of stuff about how the traps worked this
year when placed in certain areas relative to susceptible plants. Maybe
worth reading if you decide to use traps in the future. I just changed out
one of the jugs this morning. The beetles are still pretty active here
right now, but they seem to be getting a little less so than last week. I
can't believe what they did to a plum tree next door. 99% of the leaves are
just skeletons made up of viens. I don't know how often that can happen
before the tree dies.

On another note, I like your reference to the critters as "idiot beetles".
That pretty much describes them.

Joel
wrote in message
...
I invented something, too. All my neighbors adopted it.

Instead of the bags, which fill up in an hour, I just put a bucket of
soapy water under the attractor. As soon as the idiot beetles hit or
try to land on the attractor, they fall straight down into the bucket.

Then I toss the whole mess out into the field.

Those bags of dead beetles are the most horrible stench I've ever
smelled in my life....1000 times worse than diapers.