Poorly gooseberry,,,an education

This post may bore the gardening gloves of some folk, but I hope it will be educational to some...makes it all worthwhile if it does.

I have been watching one of my gooseberrie bushes..
As you can see in the picture it is a very weak looking specimen..
Very small fruit, dry small, leaves.
Last year this particuler bush produced some real nice fruit, so it was obvious something was wrong




Time to investigate... chief suspect was the vine weevil.. A nasty little crtter that loves to devour the root sytems of plants. particularly potted plants.

The root ball came out easy and as you see there is very little new growth in the ball.


No vine weevil grubs in site, but at this time of the year they would probable be young adults beetles.
Digging deeper I finally find the problem that has wasted my gooseberry

Thats the dreaded vine weevil beetle............
So, only one thing to do now. bin the plant and the compost.. such a shame.

With the container washed in jeyes fluid it is now refilled and replanted with some peas.

 

Not boring at all...especially as I had never seen what the dreaded bettle looked like.

Shame about the gooseberry bush, however.

 

It`s a weevil all right, but Vine weevil are spotted, not striped. Why bin the plant? Why not just wash off the compost and replant?

 

Morning David.
To be truthful there are other reasons for binning the plant. I have very limited space in my little garden and I seem to be filling every little corner.
Im sure you aware that gooseberry needs a bit of space around as I have found out on many occasions which resulted in me drawing blood. ( those spikes are sharp )
It really was the wrong thing to buy for my garden.
Quite right to point out that the plant will probable be ok as you suggested

 

Well i bloomin enjoyed that, thanks for taking the time & effort. Shame about the gooseberry, but usefull to know about the vine weeeeeeeeeevil, sorry, know how to start spelling that, but don't know how to stop.

 

There's a reason why it has evil in its name then? :hehe:

I found this interesting and educational, it's always good to have knowledge so if bad things start happening to my plants in the future, I know what to look for.

Sorry to hear about your gooseberry bushes, but replacing them with peas is good.

 

so can we prevent vine weeevils by a barrier method, like cabbage root fly ?

 

Ok.. here we go.. and I hope I have got my facts correct.. Please someone correct me if I`m wrong.
Lets start with the weevil as a beetle. It is slow moving and prefers to enter pots from underneath.
(It can also be found under ground plants.)
Once in the pot the beastie makes it way to the root ball.
When the time comes It will plant its eggs. From this point on the damage has started.
The larvea are white grubs with a tiny black / brown heads.
Its these that will consume the roots of plants, weakening its growth and in worst case killing it.
These bugs turn to beetles and off they go in search for more plants to invade.

This picture is from last year


How to prevent it?
My pots this year are stood on those plastic feet to get the pots off the ground. May well make it tougher for the weevils to get up into the pots.