webworms / tent worms attacking my hops plants

[wendallsan]

Hi all,

I have a hops yard with about 20 hops mounds, most mounds are a different variety. I have webworms (which may be confused with tent worms) on 4 plants. They eat the leaves and crap all over the hops so you wouldn't want to use them. I've sprayed them with BT but they haven't apparently stopped, I checked them today and 2 plants are still heavily infested. I only use organic methods on my farm, and am looking for a solution for this, short of physically squishing every one of those worms by hand. I live in southern Kentucky. Any ideas?

[spiderwrangler]

BT does take a bit to work, as they must ingest the BT in order for it to work, so make sure you are spraying the leaves they are feeding on and not the caterpillars themselves. They are gonna be hard to spray if they are are within the tent, it will tend to block your spray. Depending on how high up they are on your hops, you could cut through the webbing to allow for better penetration. If those hops that they are on are severely infested, it may just be easier to write them off, cut them down and burn the little buggers.

[wendallsan]

Alright, thanks for the encouragement that the BT will help. I'll apply more today. I did spray inside the tents and the leaves around the tents. A couple of the vines have cleared up, a couple others have been fully encased and eaten alive! It seems like certain varieties are prone to infestation while others aren't. One vine will be covered and the one next to it is untouched. Anyway, I'll keep on with the BT treatments and see what happens. Thanks very much for your help.