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I have had multiple plants in my vegetable garden that have seemed to just vanish from the garden over the period of about a week. I have notice pill bugs eating the remains of the plants. They seem to be focused on my lettuce. How can I determine if the pill bugs are the ones at fault or if they are just feasting on the fatal lettuce remains? If they aren't the pill bugs, how do I determine what would cause it?

A little bit of detail: This is a new garden in which I pulled up grass and placed a thick layer of Miracle-Gro's Garden Soil for Flowers and Vegetables on-top of the clay soil that we have here. We have had a very large amount of rain over the last couple weeks that has caused everything to stay saturated for days along with some high winds that took out some of my tulips. I am in hardiness zone 6b.

Here is a picture of what the damage looks like on plant that was in good shape yesterday.

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And the little guys under the damage (sorry for the blurry photo, I tried multiplies and this is the best focus I could get)

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And a new discovery today. The bottom of my bell pepper plant appears to have been chewed on.

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In my experience, the pillbugs are unlikely to be the problem. I'd look for evidence of bigger critters - toothmarks, tracks, holes in the ground, etc. And apparently, the plants don't "vanish" because the pillbugs are eating the remains. Are they cut off at the soil line, or what? How big are the plants? – Ed Staub Mar 27 '12 at 2:12
By vanish I mean I saw the lettuce leaves getting eaten over a weeks time. I didn't have time to check what it was until now and found 30+ of them working away on another leaf. They were still pretty small, only planted a few weeks ago. – Kellenjb Mar 27 '12 at 2:44

4 Answers

up vote 5 down vote accepted

I have only ever noticed pill bugs feasting on stuff that is piling up and rotting as they usually don't come out into the air or sunshine. So I would be interested to know if you have enough space between plants and if you are leaving food (rotting leaves etc. piling up near plants). It seems strange that these guys would come out into the open to feed.

I have actually posted several questions about trying to control slugs etc. that were eating my lettuce, but I was never quite sure what it was. I ended up finding the source of the problem by going outside at night just before I went to sleep with a torch. If I needed to go the bathroom late at night I also went outside for a look until I eventually found the culprit. It was then a matter of control.

Your choices are then: manual removal by going out at nighttime for several nights physically removing the invaders, using traps (beer trap, slug pellets) or spraying your plants so they don't taste nice. Unfortunately in your case if the rain persists the last two options don't work.

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+1, I would have guessed slugs too. – bstpierre Mar 27 '12 at 3:49
Never had a problem with pill bugs - they go after stuff that is dead (e.g. wood) and usually stay under stones,etc. Look for slime marks - these would indicate slugs. – winwaed Mar 27 '12 at 12:28
They were under the dead leaves from the lettuce so no sun light was hitting them directly. It wasn't until I was trying to clean up the dead plant that I noticed them. I haven't seen any slugs around, but I will try to check them out at night to see if I can find anything out. – Kellenjb Mar 27 '12 at 18:13
@Kellenjb If you don't see any slime remnants (shiny stuff), it's probably not slugs. But looking at night is still a great idea. Are the leaves mostly eaten from the top, while they're still attached, or are they mostly first cut off, and then eaten once they're on the ground? Do you think you can post a photo? – Ed Staub Mar 27 '12 at 22:37
@EdStaub I have added photos to my post. No slim on anything. But I did find today that my bell pepper was chewed on at its base. – Kellenjb Mar 28 '12 at 0:28
up vote 1 down vote

They are pill bugs. I'm having the same problem and I have caught them in the act. They have slowly eaten all my cucumber plants and all my pole beans. My raised beds are infested with them this year for some reason. I might have to give up on those things for this year. They are not bothering my tomatoes or squash or peppers for some reason, not yet anyway.

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up vote 1 down vote

We've always had a lot more trouble with insects, especially with young plants, when there was a lot of woody mulch, as is shown in the picture. For instance, we would have problems with earwigs swarming plants after dark and doing a lot of leaf damage. Earwigs aren't supposed to be a pest, but there you go. I think this is because the woody mulch provides a place for them to hide during the day. We now use grass clippings (not too green, not too much, no -cides), and only after plants are established.

This doesn't apply to cutworms - they burrow underground during the day. For them, we use cutworm collars around young plants - in our case, recipe #5.

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earwigs are pests to leafy vegetables – jmusser Mar 28 '12 at 13:24
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From your blurry photo I cannot tell whether you have pill millipedes or pill bugs. Even though they are not related, they live in the same habitat and eat the same things. In my answer to this related question, I pointed out that woodlice are some of nature's dead plant matter recyclers, digesting the dead matter that accumulates on the ground. Pill bugs are the same in their eating habits. Sometimes they will chew on ripe strawberries, and things like that, but that is not normal. Those holes were definitely not made by any of these critters. I also think it could be slug, but There are many other things that would love to munch your plants. Once you narrow down your list of suspects, the control method will be easier to find also. Your pepper damage could have been a cutworm.

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I agree - the pepper looks like cutworm damage. – Ed Staub Mar 28 '12 at 2:21

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