'Morning, folks: I need some advice about what kills earwigs.

I'm being plagued with them. I have a load of plants in pots, which are up on benches (to keep the slugs and snails away, for drainage, and for the benefit of my poor old back), but the earwigs are infesting them.

The benches are raised on little stacks of house bricks, which I now realise are perfect lurking grounds for earwigs...

Does ant powder actually kill them?
Would a ring of ant powder around each leg keep them out?

Any comments welcomed!

Rachel

Sasha, I'm so sorry, the answers to my plea for earwig help seem to have appeared in your Buddleia thread, I have no idea why...

Because they are infesting the undersides of my pots, making holes in the rootball, which may or may not be bad for the plant, but is definitely not good for when I try to sell them.
Not quite that simple, as I'm stuck with the piles-of-bricks...

Hi Spider, they are definitely earwigs (I have woodlice as well, the question applies equally to both), and I already squish every day (yuck) but the numbers keep increasing, and I really need to do something more proactive.

Do you think the trays of water would work? Can earwigs swim? I dropped a few in my dipping trough once, to see if the fish would eat them (yes, I have fish in my water trough, keeps the mozzies at bay) and they certainly don't drown, they just thrash around for aaaaages. So I wasn't at all sure that the "moats" would work... yes, I had thought of that, but didn't know if they drowned, plus there are a lot of legs, plus the yard slopes so the moats would have to be quite deep.. not a simple answer, sadly.

Jake, thank you for your full reply - and thank you for confirming that insecticides are unlikely to be effective now that it's colder. I won't waste money on that, then! I'd love to have proper staging, btw, but I am operating on a shoestring, and bricks/pallets were free, so I'm stuck with them for now.

I am scrupulous about removing dead leaves etc: the only plant they actually ate was the very tall white asters, whose petals were shredded every single day, and which therefore were unable to go up for sale, drat. But they are invading the pots from below, so even if they are only using my pots as hotels, I really don't want them there, for the sake of future customers, if nothing else. Apologies to those who don't squish.....but I must, I really must!

Funny man..... I am very patient, that's the answer. I will do anything for my plants!!! (Bill, don't encourage him, please!)

OK, so it sounds as though ant powder won't work (as no-one mentioned it) but moats around the legs - OF THE BENCHES... - might. I'll see if I can do one bench, and use that as a test, perhaps?

Many thanks, one and all, for your contributions, and sorry again to Sasha for somehow unknowingly invading your post..

Rachel

Not your fault. Gardenbanter is inept at threading and often gets the posts muddled. If you were reading urg directly, it's even possible that the posts aren't muddled there.