keep finding fully dried buds on my flowering plants.

[auggiewest]

I have 6 flowering plants around week 7. But when i do a close inspection i find half, sometimes whole buds dried out and falling off. granted its nice to be able to sample my product early but something is wrong. I think that caterpillars are bitting the buds at the stem, dislocating it. then it drys there till i find it. any ideas.

 

[Rolln J]

you said it - dreaded caterpillars! - get some magnifying glasses and tweezers and find and KILLKILLKILL as many as you can! not much you can do at week 7 as far as a spray unless you want to smoke BT.

most likely these are from moths - the pillars can be very small to huge - but some of the worst ones are about 1/4 inch.

 

[onlytoken]

Are these outdoor plants? The timing seems about right for an outdoor strain in North California. You can remove as many caterpillars as possible and place an upside down Solo cup around the main stalk of the plant (towards the base of it). Cut the cup in half, and cut a hole on the bottom of the cup shaped to the girth of the main stalk. Spray the inside and outside of the cup with a natural or chemical pest deterrent and tape/glue the cup back together. This should form a barrier so the ones whom crawl up the stem will not do so anymore... doesn't really help if they're coming from above though, darned leaping buds flying off of other trees =)

Lizards like hanging out on the buds and eating bugs too... don't think they would damage the inside stem though.

Good luck!