Hello everyone,
I've not been on the forums much this summer, so perhaps this topic has been mentioned already.

I have been seeing Grubs on the driveway, sidewalk and some in the lawn as well.
I had never seen them before, and all I can say is do not google images of grubs while you are eating! Nearly spit out my food. Yuck!
I'm not surprised that they are all over our yard since we had a bumper crop of Japanese Beetles around this past June/July.

So I must also confess that this has also been a bad summer for not being able to take care of the lawn as much as before. I assumed the big dead spots in the lawn were a combination of 1) not enough irrigation and all the hot weather 2) shadow over part of the grass from tent put up to cover construction materials on our patio 3) me not being able to do much for the lawn this summer because of this construction. I guess the grubs also had a role to play in the story.

Oh well. Now, how do I kill the grubs? Since they have hatched, and are quite disgustingly large, is there something I can do about them?

I'm already planning on prepping & reseeding the dead areas. If you're wondering, the construction is now complete, the tent is gone and I'm able to irrigate the seeded areas. Is there anything special that I should include in my prep work for seeding considering the presence of grubs?

Thanks!
Carolyn

How large is "disgustingly large"?

Ok, so the neighbors really think I'm crazy. Just read your post and went outside with a tape measure to measure the grubs on the driveway and sidewalk. I saw them as I was coming back in and I'm sure they're wondering what I just did.

Anyway, a grub that is currently in the throws of death from being in the sun on a hot cement driveway is about an inch to an inch and a quarter. It's hard to tell because it's curling up. I saw one on the grass just now that's about an inch long. Earlier today while walking the dog out front he was fascinated by one that was about 1.5-2 inches long.
However, that one I think came from my neighbors' yard as her "mow & blow" team had just come by and they'd blown all the stuff onto the sidewalk by her driveway and scooped it up there.

To me, they are pretty disgusting to look at, so perhaps that adjective wasn't the best one to describe how big they are! Lol!

Pardon me for being really stupid, and I've never had a very serious Japanese Beetle grub problem (a few here or there), but these things just hatched out in late July or so. Two inches long already? That doesn't sound right to me. And while I understand the mow-and-blow situation, there are JB grubs above ground this time of year other than the few mow-and-blow ones?

Are you certain that these are JB grubs?

Ok, so they say a picture is worth a thousand words...so...

I'm definitely not an expert on grubs, but they look just like the first photo found on this website when you look at google images for 'grubs'. If that's not a Japanese Beetle, then it's some other kind of beetle. In any case, it's a grub of a beetle.
Will it matter if it's not a JB, but another type of beetle for killing them?
Are there some methods better than others for different kinds?

grub ID

Here are 2 photos I took just now after gathering up 2 that were on the driveway. They are a bit squished up right now as they aren't walking (suffocating in a ziplock bag actually). When they are all stretched out, the one on the top was at least 1.5 inches long.

Sidebar to all: don't even broach the topic of Grubex with CBER --- the location is included in a Long Island Restriction banning Grubex.

Grub-e...oh, bugger.

Sevin, perhaps? It worked well on my September invasion of grubs, but doesn't have much residual.

I'm guessing something like this product will be in my future plans?

Bayer grub killer

I didn't know that GrubEx was banned in NY until Andy just mentioned it.
Does anyone have any experience using a product like the Bayer one I linked above?
Are there better products or practices to rid our lawn of this many grubs?

I've never had a grub problem before, so this is all new territory for me.
I have read around the internet and from what I gather other organic options take quite a while to go into effect (i.e.: milky spore etc.). Although perhaps I can first go for a quick kill and then build up the milky spore population?
Anyone have any experience with milky spore treatments?

Oh, and here's a look at the terrible shape my back yard is in...don't mind the weeds...





Notice the grub in this photo on the right hand side:

Grubex isn't banned in NY. It's OK in NY, but has a "Long Island/NYC Restriction". We folks in the Hudson Valley spend our lives trying to explain to online vendors that a Long Island Restriction does not affect the rest of NY. You guys should secede or something.

Those are grubs alright. Blow them up until they are an inch in diameter and 4 inches long and that's what we get.

When you saw the bumper crop of Japanese beetles - that was the first clue that you would have a problem. THEN was the time to put out beneficial nematodes. The brand that I use is on the web here. I can get them locally but they are more expensive than ordering online. Check around. Your results might be different.

Beneficial nematodes do not kill the grubs directly. They carry a disease that kills the grub. The lifecycle goes like this: BN penetrate the grub through any orifice they can find. The disease is carried on the exterior of the BN so the grub is infected immediately. The BN lay eggs inside the grub. The disease spreads like wildfire through the grub killing it in 48 hours. When the BN eggs hatch, the bacterium that is the disease becomes food for the BN babies. Then the babies (275,000 of them) go looking for another host to infect. So if you put 1 million BN out this week, by the end of next week you will have 275 billion of them. Of course not all survive but you can see how the population of BN increases extremely rapidly. That is why you would ideally put them out when you first notice the bumper crop of Japanese beetles. You would catch the grubs when they are teensy and never get to where you are now,.

BN will arrive as a smear on a 2-inch square piece of foam, sort of like a flat sponge. You wring the sponge out into a gallon of water and apply that gallon of water with a hose end sprayer to the yard. At this point if you look closely you can see them wiggling around. They are tiny but still visible if you have good eyes.

BN must have moist soil to move around. The best time to apply is on the second day of a 3-day rain event. Next best time is after you have watered for the week. I would water half of the weekly amount, apply the BN, then finish the weekly amount. That will wash them into the soil where they can find the insects.

Have you dug around in your lawn looking for them. If you dig up 1 square foot of sod and find less than a dozen grubs, then you probably don't have a serious problem...other than they are creepy and seem to be everywhere. Could it be you have so many that they cannot all live in peace and harmony in the turf??? Eeeeeewwww! Probably in your case you don't have to dig around. They are coming up to you and saying, "Howdy Y'all!"

Sorry Andy, I got that idea from the Scotts Website at the bottom next to their "available sizes" section:

GrubEx

I guess they don't specify that it's only unavailable on LI on their website.

Dchall:
Thanks for the information. I'd much prefer an organic route. In your opinion, would it be a bad idea to combine something like a Sevin or Bayer application AND the beneficial nematodes, or is that just a waste of money to do both?
You can see in the photos I posted of the lawn...it's in pretty bad shape. I understand it will take a while to get it back into a "presentable" state. Right now I'm happy that this is in my back yard, and not yet the front! Lol!

Sevin is definitely not an organic approach. If you have dogs or kids, keep them off until the Sevin is worked down in. I hate that stuff but my wife insists on it for her veggies. That battle is not worth fighting. Her daddy did it that way.

From what I've read over the years (and years) on the web, people in the south have better luck with beneficial nematodes and people in the north have better luck with milky spore. Yet the milky spore people continually say that you have to apply it every 6 months for several years to see any improvement. Down here we very seldom get year after year infestations of any insect, so it is hard to make a claim like that. But I have very little confidence that people apply beneficial nematodes properly, so consider it anecdotal information with very low confidence. How's that? When I apply like I said, it works great. Don't see why it would not work the same for you. But if you apply to dry soil or don't follow up with PUH-LENTY of water, then you just wasted your money.

Thanks for the info.

Anyone else in the NY area have any success with organic methods?

Nematodes had a reputation for not working well up North, but this year I saw many more garden stores beginning to carry them. It will take a little time for feedback.

cberhomengarden wrote:Thanks for the info.

Anyone else in the NY area have any success with organic methods?

I put Milky Spore down for 2 years 3x a year and did nematodes last year. Had very few grubs this year, but still had some. I'm in Roslyn. I did have a few areas where racoons were digging and put down Sevin (I think it was in June). Next year I may do the nematodes again.

In the peak of July I never saw more than 2 or 3 dead beetles on my front porch that has a light that stays on until about 3 AM.

jglongisland - Thanks for the reply.
This summer has been a bit wild with the insects around our neighborhood. We had tons of the beetles, and we've had a bazillion mosquitoes. Without bug spray, if I go out for more than 5 minutes I get at least 3 mosquito bites!
I don't think the city did any spraying this year as they had in years past when there were big stories about West Nile virus around. Perhaps that's why we're seeing more insects of all kinds.

Unfortunately when the beetles were around, we were in the middle of construction on the house. So the garden was unfortunately the lowest priority around here. At least I can look at it from my new kitchen and see how sad & pathetic it is looking! Lol!

I'm on the grub hunt now though. So watch out grubs! Here I come!

cberhomengarden wrote:Thanks for the info.

Anyone else in the NY area have any success with organic methods?

Used Milky Spore previously as well (mid-hudson valley) and have seen a decent drop over the last few years in Japanese Beetles. Unfortunately had an outbreak of web worms this year, which are now under control, but will look into an organic means of taking care of them next time around.

dss - Thanks for the reply!
I found some milky spore today and will attempt to get it down tonight if all goes according to plan.

Sorry guys, I was so grossed out by all these grubs (and how big they are) that I skipped organic for now. I want these guys dead, and fast! Considering I've not put any chemical pesticides/insecticides on my lawn since I moved in 6 years ago, I figure once in 6 yrs isn't going to create an EPA superfund site anytime soon.

I'm watering in the Bayer stuff now. Die grubs die!!!!
But I did buy a bag of milky spore as well, and figure I will switch to that for grub maintenance and put that out this fall. I don't want to keep putting this Bayer stuff on there.

So am I bad organic wannabe?
I do the whole milorganite, grains (or ringers, whichever is easier to procure at the time), molasses with beer, mow high, water all at once when it needs it etc etc., and generally leave it be otherwise.

I was disheartened to read that beetles prefer a fertile, moist soil. So the good I am doing to the yard seems to bring them to me. Hrmph! Hopefully the milky spore maintenance will keep them at much lower, and less destructive levels in seasons to come.
Thanks everyone for the help!
I'll keep you posted how the yard looks later in the fall.

Well, dead grubs do count as organic matter. If you're into it, this might be a good time to consider brewing a good compost tea, or applying a light dusting of quality compost to help re-populate the microbes. If not, just put down the grains and encourage with some molasses - they'll come back someday.