Blackfly on beans

[p.penn]

The only veg I am growing this year are beans. I wasn't going to grow anything except flowers, and replaced my veg bed with dahlias, which are in full flower and doing very well. However, my grandchildren had other ideas and collected all the bean seeds that were on the earth after the winter, dug a hole in the most awkward place, planted them, and I now have a wigwam of runner/borlotti beans!

Yesterday I filled a yellow bucket with water and popped it next to the beans, and I it has already attracted qúite a few blackfly. For a non -chemical solution, it really does trap them - must be a yellow bucket though.

[lancashire lass]

For a non -chemical solution, it really does trap them - must be a yellow bucket though

That's interesting about the colour and a clever idea. I noticed a similar thing last year with the blue and yellow sticky papers you can hang up in the greenhouse as I reported in my gardening diary:

I couldn't help notice the differences between the sticky yellow and sticky blue cards - I hung up both colours in the polytunnel in case some bugs were attracted to different colours and it seems that is the case. Most flies and other insects were mainly attracted to yellow (with some blue), but the fruit flies (harmless - usually breed in compost/rotting vegetation which is probably where the recent batch have come from) were definitely attracted to the blue