We harvested the first of the beans at Epworth Veggie Garden last week. I knew we'd have quite a few more beans this week, but I've never picked so many beans at one time. We ended up with 22 - 1 quart bags of beans. This year, we planted a mix of bush beans including green, purple and yellow beans.
Seems like earlier in the season, we lucked out and did not have a problem with the Mexican Beans Beetles. That has suddenly changed and I'm worried we could lose our beans crops soon from these beetles.
We could dust the beans with Sevin, but we really try to not use any type of pesticides in the garden. Its amazing how quickly the beetles can multiply and also how quickly they can destroy the plants. First you'll notice all the holes they've chewed on the young leaves. Next you'll start to notice where the beetles have chewed on some of the beans.
Perhaps I will order some type of biological control to try to save the beans.
As I recall, an elderly garden club president said she used ordinary flour to deter beetles, instead of Sevin (which was more expensive, & of course more toxic), merely lightly dusting the plants when they weren't wet of course. Hope this helps!
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