Courgette Pest help

[kelscrop]

Hi, i'm totally new to growing my own, my 3 year old started to get interested so here I am! I am growing courgettes in the wonderful B&Q orange buckets as recommended here but i've noticed this morning that I have quite a few leaves with black eggs on the back. Does anyone know what these could be and how I deal with them in a child friendly way? I've not been able to find any information on the internet and i've got quite a few courgettes growing and don't want to lose my crop!

Any help would be greatly appreciated

[ginger ninger]

Welcome to the vine Kelscrop, the only thing I have that bothers my courgette are slugs and snails I've never had egg's of any kind of insect on them, but I'll have a look in some of my books and see if there's anything in there that could help you...there my dads really old books so there could be something in them that the modern internet has missed.

[ginger ninger]

P.S...just a thought could they be droppings of some other plant near by...I'd check for caterpillars.

[kelscrop]

Thank you so much for your reply, they have attracted quite a few ants too but took that to be normal! I'm growing them next to strawberries in large pots - not sure if that would attract things not normally attracted to courgettes? They were doing so well too!!! Have about 25 baby courgettes growing.

Many thanks for taking the time to help )

[zazen999]

Child Friendly? Take the affected leaves off, stamp on them and put them in the compost heap.

[rustylady]

Sounds like aphids (blackfly). Squish them when the children aren't around.

[kelscrop]

I've just checked them again - i'm not sure now if its droppings or eggs! The ants are eating whatever it is and it seems to be on a lot of the leaves in small bunches. There aren't any tell tale signs that its caterpillars, i.e. none of the leaves have been munched on! Sorry to sound so clueless!!!

If i removed all the affected leaves i'd be left with a stump in the middle!!!

Would simply 'cleaning' off the leaves have any affect?

[womble]

Squish them when the children aren't around.

S*d that, I was teaching my DD to squash and find sawfly caterpillars, she started off OK, but then didn't want to squash them anymore as it made a mess on her fingers, we settled on her finding them and me squashing them. Or we fed them to the chucks.

Very useful for looking at things low down, kids are. I use her for picking the peas as well, she gets the low ones and me the tall.

Child labour? Probably

[ginger ninger]

Kalscrop...If you have one, could you pop a photo on for us to have a look at, that's way we can see what you've got on your plant's.

[oldie]

My courgettes have a load of blackfly and ants so I suspect that may be the problem. Squish them or use the soapy water solution.

[ddiogyn]

They sound similar to those on my courgettes (pictures within thread):

[Two_Sheds]

The ants are eating whatever it is

The black things are blackfly (aphids) and the ants are farming/protecting them. Squish them all.

It will be slugs and/or snails eating the foliage. Use traps/bait or whatever if you feel it's necessary, but they usually grow too fast to be bothered by a little foliage loss

[anilkumar9]

Courgette pests.

I am growing courgettes in Pots.Currently they are in 6 inch diameter pots and the leaves have grown just about 6 inches.This morning I saw some tiny brown what looked like larvae on the core stem of one of the plants and few on one other.I just wiped them off.But do I need to do more ?What are these ?Thanks
Do they benefit from bark chipping mulching?

P S I would like to continue growing courgettes in pots so I can have day to day control as opposed to putting them on my allotment.

How big pots I should put these plants into?