I'd rather start this post with the picture above, of one of the new nasturtiums coming out of the ground today. There are several coming up right where they were planted!
Now I'll move on to another picture from today...
I found this little guy, and about 15 of it's mates, wiggling in the dirt around a pumpkin seed today. It really is tiny- about 1/2 cm long, and about 1 mm wide. This picture was taken of a "grublet" under our microscope at 30X.
I had grown impatient for a sign of germination from the pumpkin seeds, and decided to gently unearth one to see if it had started. That's when I found these little grublets.
Just for the full effect of my disgust, here is a video of the grub under the microscope today:
Under the microscope, they look like mini squash borer grubs that I cut out of the stems of my pumpkin plants last year. Yikes! A grub looks like any grub, however, and perhaps they aren't squash borers. I don't want to take chances though- out they went!!
It compelled me to unearth the other seeds to see if I could find any more. I didn't find any. Some of the pumpkin seeds are indeed germinating, though, and I gently covered them back up again.
Could pumpkin seeds somehow harbor borer eggs, that come to life and hatch with the planting of the seed?
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