- (Focus Area) Health
Advice for the Home Gardener from the Help Desk of the
UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County
Help Desk Response: As I said in our conversation today, your insect is not a bed bug, but rather a mite of some kind. From its appearance, I believe it is a rat mite. There are also bird mites that can invade homes and bite people, but its appearance is closer to the rat mite.
These mites need rodents to survive, but will come into homes when their preferred hosts die or decrease in number. They cannot survive for too long without their hosts, even though they feed on humans. If there is a large population of rodents (rats or mice) in your attic or crawlspace, you might see a continued presence of these mites.
Here is a link to information from Contra Costa Vector Control District: https://www.contracostamosquito.com/mites.htm and from
Alameda County Vector Control about biting mites:
http://acvcsd.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Mites.pdf.
I didn't ask if you had rodent problems in your home, but I would be surprised if you did not (rat infestations are very common in our area). These links below are to information about controlling rats and mice: http://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn74106.html;
http://ipm.ucanr.edu/QT/housemousecard.html.
More information can also be found on the Vector Control districts.
I hope this information is helpful and you're able to get rid of these pesky biting creatures. Please let us know if you have more questions.
Help Desk of the UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County (SEH)
Note: UC Master Gardeners Program of Contra Costa's Help Desk is available almost year-round to answer your gardening questions. Except for a few holidays (e.g., last 2 weeks December), we're open every week, Monday through Thursday for walk-ins from 9:00 am to Noon at 2380 Bisso Lane, Concord, CA 94520. We can also be reached via telephone: (925) 608-6683, email: ccmg@ucanr.edu, or on the web at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/Ask_Us/. MGCC Blogs can be found at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/HortCoCo/ You can also subscribe to the Blog.
Advice for the Home Gardener from the Help Desk of the
UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County
MGCC's Help Desk Response: Thank you for contacting the UC Master Gardener Program's Help Desk about the grubs in your planters. Grubs are primarily pests of lawn grass, preferring turf grass roots to other plants. While they will feed on other plants' roots, they typically are not a big problem in planters.
It's not unusual to find grubs in your soil in the winter. The larvae overwinter in the soil, and emerge in late spring and summer. Your picking them out of the soil and leaving them on top for the birds was exactly the right thing to do. You don't need to discard the soil. Most gardens can tolerate some grubs in the soil, unless the population becomes very high.
For more information about grubs in a vegetable garden MGCC Help Desk covered previously, follow this link: https://ucanr.edu/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=25191. Included in that link is another link to using beneficial nematodes to control grubs if you find you continue to have problems.
Happy gardening! Please contact us again if you have more questions.
Help Desk of the UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County (SEH)
Note: UC Master Gardeners Program of Contra Costa's Help Desk is available almost year-round to answer your gardening questions. Except for a few holidays (e.g., last 2 weeks December), we're open every week, Monday through Thursday for walk-ins from 9:00 am to Noon at 2380 Bisso Lane, Concord, CA 94520. We can also be reached via telephone: (925) 608-6683, email: ccmg@ucanr.edu, or on the web at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/Ask_Us/. MGCC Blogs can be found at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/HortCoCo/ You can also subscribe to the Blog.
Advice for the Home Gardener from the Help Desk of the
UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County
Client's Request (visiting at the MG/Ag Office at 2380 Bisso Ln, Concord): I found these insects (see below) inside my house in my closet. A friend of mine thought they might be “kissing bugs”. Would you please identify them, what their presence and problems they might cause, and recommend what I should do about them?
The common name of the insects you brought in is the leafhopper assassin bug. Scientific name is Zelus renardi. The leafhopper assassin bug is considered a beneficial insect in that it feeds on other insects, including pests such as caterpillars of the cabageworm butterfly, leafhoppers, and aphids. Here is a link to some University of California information about the insect: http://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/NE/assassin_bugs.html
When you were in our offices, you said you hoped that the insects were not “kissing bugs”. You might be interested to learn that assassin bugs and kissing bugs are closely related in that they belong to the same insect family—the Reduviidae family. Apparently, assassin bugs are often confused with kissing bugs. The feeding habits of the two insect lines are quite different--kissing bugs feed on the blood of mammals (including humans). Here is a link to UC's information on the kissing bug side of the family: http://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn7455.html
You might be interested in reading this blog article which talks about the differences between assassin bugs like the ones you found and the kissing bugs: https://ucanr.edu/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=24611
It's hard to know how one of the assassin bugs found its way into your closet. I wonder if perhaps it flew in through a window or door and somehow made its way to your closet. In doing my research I found this story on the website for the Marin/Sonoma Mosquito/Vector Control District: https://www.msmosquito.com/the-bug-blog/2012/03/leafhopper-assassin-bug. It describes an encounter a citizen had with an assassin bug that had somehow found its way into the citizen's bed. As described in the link, the assassin bug can inflict a painful bite if they encounter a threat, but they don't seek to bite humans or other mammals.
Since I have determined that your insects are “beneficial” predators, I'll take them home and release them in my vegetable garden area. Since assassin bugs are not typically pests, you probably don't need to take any action. If you should find others in your house, you might want to be careful about leaving doors or windows open which could allow them a way into the house.
Hope this information is helpful. If you have other questions, you are welcome to contact our Help Desk. We're open Monday through Thursday from 9 a.m. to noon and are also here to support the Ag Dept on Thursday afternoons. You are welcome to stop by or you can phone us or email us to save yourself a drive.
Help Desk of the UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County (TKL)
Note: UC Master Gardeners Program of Contra Costa's Help Desk is available almost year-round to answer your gardening questions. Except for a few holidays (e.g., last 2 weeks December), we're open every week, Monday through Thursday for walk-ins from 9:00 am to Noon at 2380 Bisso Lane, Concord, CA 94520. We can also be reached via telephone: (925) 608-6683, email: ccmg@ucanr.edu, or on the web at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/Ask_Us/. MGCC Blogs can be found at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/HortCoCo/ You can also subscribe to the Blog (//ucanr.edu/blogs/CCMGBlog/)
Advice for the Home Gardener from the Help Desk of the
UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County
Client's Request: My sister brought me some heads of hardneck garlic from her harvest in Idaho. I would like to know when is the best time to plant this garlic for this area. I have a fairly large garden area in my back yard in which I currently have tomatoes, eggplant, tomatillos, chiles, and a few weeds all of which are nearly at an end (except the weeds, sigh). I also have some space which I left fallow this summer. It all gets full sun. I appreciate any information you can offer. Thank you,
MGCC Help Desk Response: Thank you for contacting the UC Master Gardener program with your questions about growing garlic. From your description, it sounds as if you have a good space for growing garlic, as it needs good soil and full sun. October is the ideal time for planting garlic in our area with a harvest expected next June so they should be planted where you won't need the space for your spring planting.
If you would still like to grow garlic, you could use the heads from Idaho in your kitchen and purchase some more for growing in your garden. You can probably still find seed garlic at some local nurseries or online. Suppliers that are out of state but ship to California will have passed inspection, and there are several in-state suppliers.
Here are some UC links with more information on growing garlic in a home garden:
https://vric.ucdavis.edu/pdf/garlic.pdf and http://sonomamg.ucanr.edu/Vegetable_of_the_Month/Garlic/
We are not able to recommend any particular business, but some local nurseries may have them still in stock. Also, a Google search 'Suppliers of seed garlic California' brings up a number of Northern California suppliers and some of these websites have great information on growing needs and the different varieties.
I hope this helps, and if you have any further questions please do contact us again.
Help Desk of the UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County (SMW)
Note: UC Master Gardeners Program of Contra Costa's Help Desk is available almost year-round to answer your gardening questions. Except for a few holidays (e.g., last 2 weeks December), we're open every week, Monday through Thursday for walk-ins from 9:00 am to Noon at 2380 Bisso Lane, Concord, CA 94520. We can also be reached via telephone: (925) 608-6683, email: ccmg@ucanr.edu, or on the web at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/Ask_Us/. MGCC Blogs can be found at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/HortCoCo/ You can also subscribe to the Blog (//ucanr.edu/blogs/CCMGBlog/)
Advice for the Backyard Gardener from the Help Desk of the
UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County
Californians who raise poultry outdoors are invited to get their eggs tested for contaminants.
To find out if harmful substances on the ground that are eaten by hens get passed along in the eggs they lay, Maurice Pitesky, UC Cooperative Extension poultry specialist at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, is providing free egg testing.
"We're trying to understand the connection between the environment that backyard poultry are raised in and the eggs they are producing," Pitesky said.
Pitesky's colleague, veterinary toxicologist Birgit Puschner is testing eggs for different types of contaminants, depending on the county the eggs are from. Eggs from counties recently affected by wildfires will be tested for chemicals, building materials and heavy metals that may have been carried in the smoke and ash. Pitesky and Puschner are also looking for lead and PCBs in eggs from certain regions of the state.
The UC Cooperative Extension poultry specialist will share individual egg results with each poultry owner. At the end of the study, all of the results will be summarized and made available to the general public.
Pitesky describes the project in a video produced by CropMobster for UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine and UC Agriculture and Natural Resources. You can watch the video at https://youtu.be/3ZlytlUIS3I.
For more information about the study and how to package and ship eggs, visit http://ucanr.edu/eggtest.
UC Agriculture and Natural Resources researchers and educators draw on local expertise to conduct agricultural, environmental, economic, youth development and nutrition research that helps California thrive. Learn more at ucanr.edu.
Help Desk of the UC Master Gardener Program of Contra Costa County
Note: The UC Master Gardeners Program of Contra Costa's Help Desk is available year-round to answer our gardening questions. Except for a few holidays, we're open every week, Monday through Thursday for walk-ins from 9:00 am to Noon at 75 Santa Barbara Road, 2d Floor, Pleasant Hill, CA 94523, although we will be moving this spring. We will notify you if/when that occurs. We can also be reached via telephone: (925)646-6586, email: ccmg@ucanr.edu, or on the web at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/Ask_Us/ MGCC Blogs can be found at http://ccmg.ucanr.edu/HortCoCo/ You can also subscribe to the Blog (http://ucanr.edu/blogs/CCMGBlog/)
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