Rose Chafer
A slender tan beetle with long, spiny reddish-brown legs. It shows up in a swarm for a few weeks in early summer, chews ragged holes in flowers, and skeletonizes leaves.
Pest checklist
Four things to look for. If most of them match what you are holding, you are in the right place.
What gets rid of them
Gentlest option first. For most backyard cases the first one is enough, so try these in order and stop as soon as it works. If you do spray something, the product label tells you how — please read the notice further down.
1Hand-pick into soapy water
They are slow first thing in the morning. Knock them into a bucket of soapy water.
Try this first2Cover the plant for those weeks
Cheesecloth or row cover over roses and young vines during the flight, taken off as soon as it ends so pollinators can work the blooms.
garden mesh plant cover3Do not hang a trap
Lure traps pull in more beetles than they catch, the same trouble as Japanese beetle traps.
4Keep them away from poultry
Rose chafers are toxic to birds. Do not toss the ones you pick to chickens or ducks.
5Spray only if a plant is being stripped
Labeled garden insecticides work, but avoid spraying open flowers where bees are feeding.
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Which plants get rose chafer
Every plant we cover that gets rose chafer, grouped by type — tap any one to open its page. A note beside a plant came from that plant’s own entry, because the same pest can be a minor nuisance on one plant and a serious problem on another. Plenty of plants we do not cover get it too.
trees4
biennial1
Plant families hit hardest
Related plants often share the same problems, so if one plant in a family has it, check the others. The largest group here is Rosaceae, with 5 of the 9 affected plants.
- Rosaceae5 plants
When to treat
Treat on sight during the flight. It runs about three to four weeks from late May into June and then stops on its own. Worst on sandy, grassy ground, because that is where the grubs develop.
Timing only — the label is the law
This page tells you when to watch for rose chafer and when treating is worth considering. It is not a recommendation to apply any particular product. Read and follow the product label before you spray — under federal law the label is the legal instruction, and using a pesticide against it is illegal.
- Check the pre-harvest interval. Every product that’s cleared for an edible crop sets a minimum number of days between spraying and picking. Find it on the label before you spray anything you intend to eat.
- Check the re-entry interval before you or anyone else works in the treated area again, and use the protective equipment the label names.
- Confirm the product is registered for your crop in your state. This page groups many different crops together, and a product legal on one of them is not legal on all of them — state registrations differ too. Your state pesticide agency or local extension office can confirm both.
- Rates and mixing instructions come from the label, never from us. We don’t publish them because they differ by product and formulation.
Other problems on the same plants
If a plant gets rose chafer, these are the problems it most often gets as well, so they are worth checking for while you are out there. They tend to appear together; one does not cause another.