• Post Reply Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic
permaculture forums growies critters building homesteading energy monies kitchen purity ungarbage community wilderness fiber arts art permaculture artisans regional education skip experiences global resources cider press projects digital market permies.com pie forums private forums all forums
this forum made possible by our volunteer staff, including ...
master stewards:
  • Carla Burke
  • Nancy Reading
  • John F Dean
  • paul wheaton
  • r ranson
  • Timothy Norton
  • Jay Angler
stewards:
  • Andrés Bernal
  • Pearl Sutton
  • Anne Miller
master gardeners:
  • Christopher Weeks
gardeners:
  • M Ljin
  • Jeremy VanGelder
  • thomas rubino

Weevils: are they all evil?

 
pollinator
Posts: 1274
Location: Chicago
435
dog forest garden fish foraging urban cooking food preservation bike
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
One weevil, the plum curculio damages my cherries and plums every year.  Now some other weevil is destroying my ornamental shrubs in front of the house  (see image).

I've also heard of many other weevil pests--cotton boll weevil, bean weevil, those ones that show up in flour.

Is the whole weevil family bad news?  Does anyone know of any beneficial or at least just neutral weevils?  Or are they all trouble?
20210822_141109.jpg
Weevil on dogwood
Weevil on dogwood
 
gardener
Posts: 1811
Location: the mountains of western nc
582
forest garden trees foraging chicken food preservation wood heat
  • Likes 1
  • Mark post as helpful
  • send pies
    Number of slices to send:
    Optional 'thank-you' note:
  • Quote
  • Report post to moderator
i think there are too many different weevils to make sweeping statements. the figure i’ve heard is that if you layed out 1 member of every animal species in the world, every fifth one would be a beetle…and half of those would be weevils. Curculionidae is a huge family - something like 83,000 species.

just as some attack plants we want things from, some attack others - i know some weevils have been used as biological controls for thistles, among other things.
 
I brought this back from the farm where they grow the tiny ads:
The new kickstarter is now live!
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/paulwheaton/garden-cards
reply
    Bookmark Topic Watch Topic
  • New Topic