Something's eating my plants :'-(

[csdude55]

I know, I know, this is "technically" not about my pond! But it's about the plants surrounding my pond.

Mostly my hostas, which are supposed to be pretty hardy! Last year was the first time I noticed a problem, some of my older hostas were just dying. I dug them up to find that the roots had been almost completely eaten away!

I know that I have an issue with moles. I have tunnels everywhere, and I found 2 dead moles just laying in my driveway one day (no reason for it, totally weird), but I still have more tunnels so I have at least 1 more mole. But they shouldn't be going after the plants, right? Just grub worms, earth worms, and maybe ants (of which I have PLENTY!).

I suspected a vole, but I've seen pictures of their ruts and I haven't seen anything like that in my yard. I also have tons of other bulb flowers (literally hundreds of irises, lilies, etc) that have no problems.

Then a few days ago, I saw a hosta with yellow, wilty leaves. I thought it was maybe getting too much sun, so I went to dig it up... to see that most of the root had been eaten away! Another hosta about 3' away was just fine, though.

Upon closer inspection of the damaged hosta, I saw 4 or 5 black bugs, and a sack of orange, round eggs that looked a lot like the roe that comes on sushi. I flipped off the bugs and eggs, then rinsed the roots of both hostas well and moved them to another location. But now I'm thinking, maybe those bugs have been the problem all along?

I don't see any holes or chewed ridges on the hosta leaves, but I have a few Angels Trumpets and I definitely have holes in their leaves. Not chewed edges, though, just holes.

I've looked up pictures of weevils, and that doesn't quite look right. The ones I saw were really just one oval, maybe horizontal white lines? I don't quite remember now. And I can't swear that they LAY the eggs and weren't there to eat them.

I'm in zone 7A. We usually have stink bugs, but they're not too bad right now. Cicadas are common in my area, but I haven't seen many of those myself, either. I have hummingbirds and butterflies in abundance, a few brown birds (wren, I think) and cardinals, and a handful of frogs around the pond. And at least 1, maybe 2 black snakes that help out. But I haven't seen any of these paying attention to the hostas, so I don't know if they're going after these insects at all.

I spread DE regularly for the ants, but I don't honestly know that it has any impact. Any other guesses on what could be my troublemaker, or what else I can do to get rid of them?

 

[Jhn]

Sounds like your first guess, a vole is eating the roots of the Hosta. I have that problem as well with Hosta. Just because you don’t see their tunnels doesn’t mean they aren’t around, they will also use existing mole tunnels. Bugs aren’t going to eat the roots really they tend too munch on the leaves.

One way to prevent voles from getting at your Hosta Roots/bulbs is too put hardware cloth/mesh down first having it extend up above the ground.

They are quite a few gardeners on here that will probably have some other suggestions to prevent voles from getting at your plants.

 

[BKHpondcritters]

I agree that it sounds like vole damage. We had a similar issue earlier this Spring & ended up losing three young roses & almost lost a 4th, large/mature rose before we discovered what was going on.

If you can, as a first & immediate step, get the mulch pulled back away from the base of the targeted plants. Get some 1/4# hardware cloth & make a 'cage' for the plant roots which extends about 6+" underground & a couple of inches above the soil line. Replant the hostas inside the cages. Alternately, fill the area in around the plant bases with gravel-soil mixture & top with additional heavy gravel. Voles don't like to expose themselves, so if you can make the area right around & leading up to the base of the plants inhospitable for tunneling they might go elsewhere. And, yes, they do traverse in tunnels made by moles as well as make their own. (We never saw anything resembling a 'vole rut' in our garden, either)

Then, tell your resident snakes to step up their game! Getting rid of destructive varmints is their cost for being allowed to live at your house.