Episode 40: What’s Attacking My Azaleas?
About This Episode
On this week’s episode of Ask Grumpy, Steve Bender, also known as Southern Living’s Grumpy Gardener, helps a reader deal with azalea caterpillars. Plus, his pick for butterfly-loving Plant of the Week.
Question Of The Week
Evildoers have taken over my azaleas. Weird looking black and yellow caterpillars with red heads are eating all the leaves. Why did they pick my azaleas here in Georgia? How can I send them packing?
Grumpy Gardener Answer: Now, what you have on your azaleas are pests. They are caterpillars and surprisingly enough, they're called azalea caterpillars. And they eat azaleas and they also eat blueberries. It's a moth that lays eggs on the plant and you usually don't see them at first and then you'll go out and your whole plant is covered. So if you see these weird looking black and yellow caterpillars with red heads eating all your azalea leaves, here's what you can do: I would recommend spraying your plants according to the label directions with an insecticide you can use. There's several different ones, you can use Sevin, Malathion, or one called Triazicide. Just follow label directions, spray the foliage, and that'll get rid of those azalea caterpillars pretty quickly. And don't worry, the leaves will grow back. They won't kill the plant. It just takes off a lot of the foliage.
Plant Of The Week
Spike Blazing Star
This is a Native American perennial called Blazing Star and it is one of the best plants you can have for pollinators. Now, this plant starts off as a clump of thin grassy leaves at the base. And then, in mid to late summer, it sends up these wands that are about three to four feet tall and they have these clusters in purpley-pink flowers that resemble little bottlebrushes. And they're in bloom for a couple weeks and the pollinators love them and they also make a really great, cut flower. They give you a really nice vertical shape in your garden and you can mix them with lots of other things. The leaves also turn a nice orange-bronzy color in the fall, so there's lots of seasons of interest with this. Now, how do you grow these? It could not be really much easier. Just give them sun and about any well-drained soil is fine. Just remember their name Blazing Star. They get that because that's what the flowers look like when that spike comes up and to get more plants is really easy too. You can just let the flowers go to seed and you'll get seedlings at the base. Or, after a while, the roots will form like what looks like little bulbs in the ground. And in the springtime, you can just dig up that clump of bulbs and just separate them and then you can plant them throughout your garden. But it is a really nice plant. It's native. It has no pest- problems. And it's really, really pretty. And I say for maximum impact, don't just plant one, plant about a dozen and, you'll be surprised, they will be inundated with pollinators, hummingbirds too.
About Ask Grumpy
Ask Grumpy is a podcast featuring Steve Bender, also known as Southern Living’s Grumpy Gardener. For more than 20 years, Grumpy has been sharing advice on what to grow, when to plant, and how to manage just about anything in your garden. Tune in for short episodes every Wednesday and Saturday as Grumpy answers reader questions, solves seasonal conundrums, and provides need-to-know advice for gardeners with his very Grumpy sense of humor. Be sure to follow Ask Grumpy on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen so you don't miss an episode.
Editor’s Note: Please be mindful that this transcript does not go through our standard editorial process and may contain inaccuracies and grammatical errors.
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