Owl Creek Farm » Green Living » They move in…

They move in…

by Amy

If you follow me on facebook, you probably noticed a few pictures I’ve posted of our recent “guests”.

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They are gypsy moths (or the caterpillars that will turn into them) and they don’t want to move out.Gypsy_moth_caterpillar

Google says that BTK is “the thing” to get rid of them. We are in very rural Alberta and it took some work to find it; finally ending in a 3 hour round trip drive. We bought four bottles and sprayed two, but then in rained. And poured. And would not stop. It’s finally sunny today (about a week after the infestation took hold, about 2 weeks after they started appearing) so I am hopeful we can get the rest sprayed in time to be useful before it rains again (supposedly tomorrow, ugh).

Wisconsin was kind enough to put together a lot of pages on how to control these suckers. BTK being the main one (yay for being “natural” and non-toxic!), but of course we need them in the leaves, eating them (which thousands are, but many more are covering the house, driveway and parking area and even the main road is crawling, the spray won’t work there), and it needs to stop raining!

http://www.cityofpewaukee.us/gypsy-moth.php

http://learningstore.uwex.edu/assets/pdfs/FR-171D.pdf

http://dnr.wi.gov/topic/ForestHealth/documents/FFBtk-Butterflies.pdf

 

Amy
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1 comment

Mario April 13, 2017 - 10:34 am

Are these only common in the Northern parts of the US and Canada?

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