Red beetles on lilies

How to recognize this pest on your lilies

The original homeland of the lily chicken is both Europe and Asia. In this country it mainly affects white people Lilies, Turkish lilies, fire lilies but also imperial crowns. But they can also cause damage to lilies of the valley, chess flowers and different types of leek.

• The leaf beetle pest is a six to eight millimeter small beetle. It has striking red wings and a pronotum, which is also red. The head and legs are black. He wears long black antennae on his head.
• The larvae of Lilioceris are initially yellowish shortly after hatching and later orange. Most of the larvae look like small lumps of earth. This is because they cover their bodies with feces to protect them from predators.
• In the event of danger, the lily chicken makes soft, chirping noises. If you get very close, you can hear these sounds. It can occur in two or three generations in a year.

Keep collecting the bugs

As soon as you Beetle on your lilies, you should read them. Check the plants for new beetles every day and remove them. That sometimes takes some effort.

• If you don't act promptly, these pests can spread further. If possible, read the beetles in the early morning hours, because then they are not as mobile as they are then still in a kind of rigidity.
• Before you start collecting, you may want to know that this red beetle has a very special defense strategy. In case of danger, he drops off the lily so that he lands on his back.
• Due to the black color of the underside of his body, he is barely or not at all recognizable when lying on the floor. Beetles lying on the ground do not usually find their way back to the plant.

Use home remedies like coffee grounds to combat it

If you are one of those coffee drinkers, you shouldn't just throw away the coffee grounds. Spread it liberally on the ground around each individual lily. Repeat this at least every two days.

• You should definitely stay tuned here. Perhaps that alone is not enough, but then you have your plants at least with good quality fertilizer provided.
• The most voracious are not the adult beetles, but their larvae. Of course, if you recognize larvae on the plant, you should remove them as well. A strong jet of water does a very good job here.
• Lying on the ground, the larvae eventually perish. If you wipe them off by hand, you should only work with gloves, because after all, the larvae are contaminated with feces.

Dust the lilies with algae lime or rock flour

Dusting the plants with algae lime or rock flour can help you at least to decimate the infestation. Rock flour is finely ground basalt and algae lime is deposits of red algae. Algae lime is primarily used for soil fertilization, but also to combat various harmful pathogens, such as the lily cockerel Lilioceris.

• The difficult thing with both is spreading, because they have to somehow get to the underside of the leaves. A conventional nylon stocking can help you to get rock flour or algae lime in place.
• Pour the flour or lime into the stocking, then gently tap it against the underside of the leaves. As a rule, a sufficient amount will then stick to the leaves.
• You should repeat the treatment several times and not only when it has rained. However, you must also be careful not to pollinate the plants with it too often. Too much rock flour could hinder the breathing of the plants and cause additional damage.
• You can only prevent these red beetles by regularly checking your lilies for an infestation. Because if there has already been an infestation, you can also expect it in the next year. This is because this pest hibernates in the ground and becomes active again in spring.

Drive away the red beetles with vegetable broth or neem extracts

Plant broths are good for a lot and they should also help against the lily chicken. You can easily make such vegetable broth yourself from nettles or tansy, for example.

• For nettle broth, put 1 kilogram of fresh or 250 grams of dried herb in a plastic or wooden container with 10 liters of cold water. Then cover the container and let it stand for 24 hours, not longer. Then you can spray the plants with the undiluted broth. Spray only in cloudy weather or in the evening and not in sunshine.
• To make a broth from tansy, bring the dried tansy flowers to a boil in water. Then the whole thing has to cool down and strained. You can then spray your plants with it. For every 100 grams of dried flowers you calculate three liters of water. No matter what type of vegetable broth you use, you will have to repeat the treatment several times.

Extracts from the neem tree, such as neem oil, are also said to be effective against the larvae and less so against the red beetles. Corresponding preparations are available from specialist gardeners or on the Internet.

What if only the chemical club helps?

Chemical sprays should always be the last resort. If possible, always pay attention to preparations that are gentle on beneficial organisms and seek advice on suitable insecticides from specialist gardeners.

• The most effective are usually systemic agents based on thiacloprid, axetamiprid or dimethoath. These are contained, for example, in the products "Garden Pest Free Calypso" from Bayer, in "Pest Free Careo Spray" from Celaflor or in "Spruzit Pest Free".
• Systemically acting agents have the advantage that they are absorbed by the plant and are distributed throughout the plant. This ensures that the pest in question ingests this agent and eventually dies.

Lily chicken - a pretty but unloved beetle

This beetle and its larvae can make lilies look relatively old. If there is an infestation, you have to expect it in the next year as well. However, with regular checks and removal of the pest from spring onwards, you can usually prevent the worst.