They are on an unintentional mission of destruction.
The goal of Japanese beetles: Seek out and devour the leaves of any and all ornamental trees and shrubs.
Among those plants, however, lurks an apparent death trap -- the ivy geranium.On their surface, Japanese beetles are beautiful pests. The metallic green insects with their copper-colored wing covers gleam in the sunlight. Decorative tufts of white hair protrude from the sides of their abdomens.
But their beauty is only skin deep. A bit deeper, in the soil, is where their lifelong path of destruction begins. There they develop from eggs into grubs, feeding on grass roots.
After damaging the lawn in the spring, they emerge for a massive assault in summer, feeding on the leaves of nearly 300 susceptible plants, according to Michigan State University Turfgrass Science. Those plants include a number of fruit trees -- apples, cherries, peaches, plums and blueberries -- as well as roses, sassafras, beans and grapes.
Their first target in our yard: grapevines.The vines were just beginning to mature enough to bear fruit when the beetles first appeared. The beetles weren't many. They could easily be plucked from the leaves and drowned in a container of water.
But that wasn't sufficient. In succeeding years, they returned in even stronger numbers, leaving more and more leaves skeletonized. To add insult to injury, the skeletonized leaves give off chemicals that attract further attacks from the beetles, MSU says.
Ultimately, most of the grapevine died of old age. Just one live vine remained, so we dug out the rest in hopes that the vine would survive and the plant would once again flourish. With most of the vines dead and removed, we reasoned the Japanese beetles would be less likely to stick around.
We were wrong.This year, they are consuming the leaves on the roses and cotoneaster and are decimating the pole beans.
Each day, a fresh wave of Japanese beetles attacks. And each day, we pluck any we can see from the leaves and drown them in a container of soapy water.
One day, however, we noticed something unusual.
Japanese beetles were congregating on the ivy geranium on our porch. But they weren't emerging from the container plant alive. There they lay, either dead or dying.
Apparently, the Japanese beetles' appetite for leaves was ultimately their undoing.
Had we discovered a natural antidote to the voracious leaf-eater?
We'll find out next year, when we plan to hang several ivy geraniums high throughout the garden.
Bon appetit, beetles!
THIS WEEK'S QUESTION:
"What do you do to get rid of Japanese beetles?"
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