I have searched the previous gardening questions and I guess I'm the only one with a problem growing zuchinnis. The plants do well until they are producing squash and then something(?) starts to make light colored spots mostly on the stems and pretty soon the whole plant is disfigured!! It then dies before I can really get many squashes. I can't see bugs and the Ext. Service said ants but I don't think so. Please help. I did plant radishes with them as I heard that would help ward off bugs. Thanks so much.

-- Rita in TN (felfoot@twlakes.net), July 04, 2001

Answers

Rita, I am wondering if it's a squash borer,they eat inside the stem near the base of the plant causing the plant to wilt and die. You can spray the base of the plants with rotenone weekly.

-- TomK (tjk@cac.net), July 04, 2001.

Take a hypodermic needle and fill the syringe up with liquid rotenone/pyrethrum (Mellinger's sells it).

Inject this deadly to squash vine borers cocktail into the base of the stem where you are seeing damage.

The borer will up and die pretty quick, but the problem is they carry a virus and it may be too late to protect the plant from being infected by the virus (I forget which disease it is they commonly spread, some sort of wilt I think). So the quicker you kill the borer the better.

BTW, both rotenone and pyrethrum are organic pesticides of very low toxicity.

-- Sojourner (notime4@summer.spam), July 04, 2001.

You can't plant squash two years in a row in the same space. I don't know whether this might be your problem, but anytime I have accidently done it, I have had the same problem.

-- athome (athome@home.com), July 04, 2001.

Rita, Squash vine borer causes the plants to wilt suddenly, and you'll see some yellowish stuff around the base of the plant. If you don't have any insecticide, you can slit the stem gently and lift the worm out. Then hill dirt over the slit stem or wrap it with aluminum foil to keep it closed. You also might have squash bugs which are a huge problem in western Kentucky, They might be causing the brown spots you talk about. They even leave little spots on tomatoes. I battle them every year with varying results. The best organic way is to search the undersides of the leaves daily to kill any eggs that are laid there. Not mulching around the squash gets rid of a hiding place for them. Putting row covers on the young plants until they start to flower also helps. This year I've scattered the squash plants all over the garden; so far I haven't found the bugs on the squash although I have found eggs, but I've found them on other plants like poppy seed heads and tomatoes. Hopefully they're having trouble finding the squash.

-- Katherine (KyKatherine@Yahoo.com), July 04, 2001.

Do a search on rotenone in recent news. I can't bring to mind just what the really bad thing about it was, and I'm outta time, but it was REALLY REALLY bad health-wise. There was some discussion on this forum. Help, anyone?

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.au), July 04, 2001.

Rita the best idea is to take a plant with the signs of the disease to local extension office they will be able to tell you whats wrong and what to do about it. Good luck.

-- Wynema Passmore (nemad_72039@yahoo.com), July 04, 2001.

Got it. Studies showed Rotenone/Derris Dust caused Parkinson's disease in laboratory rats.

-- Don Armstrong (darmst@yahoo.com.au), July 04, 2001.

Hold up there fella. The study you are talking about was flawed. Also they were injecting the rotenone DIRECTLY INTO THE BLOODSTREAM. Personally I don't know anybody who mainlines rotenone, do you?

News story follows:

A common pesticide has been linked to Parkinson's disease after producing symptoms of the disease in rats.

However, scientists are cautioning that the results may not be replicated in humans.

The pesticide, rotenone, is commonly known to gardeners as Derris dust, and is widely available off shop shelves. In its concentrated form, it is used to kill noxious fish.

In the Emory University, Atlanta, experiment, scientists fed steady amounts of rotenone into the bloodstream of rats. Over time, the rats grew stiff, hunched, and developed the tremors associated with Parkinson's disease.

Examinations of their brains revealed similar degeneration to that which occurs in humans with the disease.

However, University of Canterbury biochemist Andy Pratt said he was usually quite sceptical about such links. "It's only significant, depending on how much they had to use to make the rats sick."

He said rotenone was a naturally occurring material found in plant roots. He said that it was known to be toxic at reasonably high levels.

-- Sojourner (notime4@summer.spam), July 05, 2001.