Vine Weevil Destroyed Strawberrys

[Marb67]

Well i'm gutted. One of the few successes I usually have has been spoilt by *&%$£ vine weevil grubs. Last year I built a wooden planter, filled with new compost (no vine weevil) up on a shelf (off the ground high up) on small legs and yet here they are as I pulled my sickly looking plants to find them in the roots and even burrowed into the stem.

I really feel like just giving up. I wouldn't mind as I have only got a tiny walled garden and yet it houses every pest known to man.

I take it there will be no fruit this year then ? I can't be bothered to sieve through all the compost picking them out one by one.

[peanut]

Sorry to hear about the vine weevils Marb, they are evil little blighters. I forgot to lift my begonias in Autumn and they too have been eaten away by vine weevil grubs. I think they and strawberries are their favourites.
The good news is there are lots of treatmeants available.
I grow lots in pots but empty all my pots each spring, check for vine weevil grubs and then reuse the compost. I quite like searching for the grubs and the Blackbirds and Robins always enjoy them.

[Plot70]

I have had some success with the contents of an outside ash tray from a smoking shelter infused with boiling water and filtered with a scrap old flour sieve.
If you can get some ash from a place where they smoke naughty tobacco you get an extra active ingredient for better effect.
There is nothing cost effective for treating evil vine weevils for sale.

[Marb67]

I hate anything to do with cigarettes and smoking as I won't even walk on a butt in the street. So that's out the question. Perhaps some neem oil and wood Ash? Laboriasly picking them out but I take it the plants with hardly any roots won't be worth replanting? It's absolutely sning with them. I checked all summer that no beetles were climbing up. So depressing.

[ameno]

It happens, unfortunately. Vine weevils seem to like strawberries, and potted plants always seem more vulnerable tho attack than ones in the ground.

There are soil-based nematodes you can buy which you water on in the summer and they kill the weevil larvae. They are rather costly, though, and I'd think they're not really worth it just for strawberries.
Otherwise, the best thing you can do to deter them is to grow them in soil, not compost. It's still not guaranteed to deter them, of course, but the adults prefer to lay their eggs in loose material like compost, and the larvae burrow more easily through said loose material, too, so using soil instead (especially heavier clay soil) helps to deter them.

As for replanting the strawberry plants you have left, strawberries are tough so there's actually a good chance that even the ones with barely any roots (as long as they still have green leaves) would re-root and survive as long as you coddled them a bit.
However, whether it's actually worth bothering with them is another matter. They will take most of this year just to recover, so will not fruit this year. Seeing as strawberry plants are cheap to buy and multiply quickly by runners, I personally wouldn't bother with the heavily damaged ones, and would just replace them.

[Marb67]

It happens, unfortunately. Vine weevils seem to like strawberries, and potted plants always seem more vulnerable tho attack than ones in the ground.

There are soil-based nematodes you can buy which you water on in the summer and they kill the weevil larvae. They are rather costly, though, and I'd think they're not really worth it just for strawberries.
Otherwise, the best thing you can do to deter them is to grow them in soil, not compost. It's still not guaranteed to deter them, of course, but the adults prefer to lay their eggs in loose material like compost, and the larvae burrow more easily through said loose material, too, so using soil instead (especially heavier clay soil) helps to deter them.

As for replanting the strawberry plants you have left, strawberries are tough so there's actually a good chance that even the ones with barely any roots (as long as they still have green leaves) would re-root and survive as long as you coddled them a bit.
However, whether it's actually worth bothering with them is another matter. They will take most of this year just to recover, so will not fruit this year. Seeing as strawberry plants are cheap to buy and multiply quickly by runners, I personally wouldn't bother with the heavily damaged ones, and would just replace them.

I rescued a couple of them with enough roots left on and must have killed hundreds of the grubs (quickly squashing them under foot which is considerably kinder than a slow nematode death) I shall put the old compost on the borders and re-fill with mole hill soil and get some new plants.

[Nicos]

Can you microwave the soil first marb? It would worry me that you may have missed some eggs

[Babru]

I find vine weevils eat lots of things - strawberries, roses, primulas, rhododendrons, cyclamen..... I've used nematodes as you can make enough solution to water quite an area. I do it early in the season and it reduces the numbers so my plants can get on with growing.