Garden Pest Control

Garden Pest Control is really about the regulation and control of pests that are damaging to plants. Every garden is susceptible to a pest invasion – tucking into foliage, feasting on the vegetable patch and burrowing through the bedding. Garden pests diminish the quality and look of plants and bring a bad appearance to the garden overall.

Prevention
The first method of garden pest control is prevention. Keeping pests out is the most effective and easy method of pest control. There are a number of ways of preventing insect damage in the garden. One such technique is the removal of weak plants; they tend to attract pests and thus are best disposed of. Establishment of natural and healthy soil supports the growth of strong plants, making them less vulnerable to pests. Removal and destruction of weeds, which induce the breeding of pests, is a traditional and effective means of pest prevention. Another traditional pest prevention technique is to mix plants; since insects are attracted to certain plants, the mixing of crops can reduce the probability of pests spreading throughout crops.

Ways To Control Garden Pests
Sometimes your efforts to prevent garden pests are unsuccessful. When this occurs, it is time to move into other methods of garden pest control.

• Beneficial insects and wildlife are really your best friends when it comes to controlling pests in your garden and vegetable patch. Planting simple annuals amongst your vegetables, such as Californian poppies and marigolds will attract a wealth of beneficial insects like ladybirds and hoverflies who will gobble up your aphids. Plant a few native shrubs and herbaceous perennials (i.e. hazel and hardy geraniums) in your garden; create a pond; leave a small pile of logs in the corner of your garden and feed the birds throughout the winter. Doing any or all of these will keep enough wildlife in your garden to eat thousands of pests and their eggs.
• Healthy growth depends on a healthy soil. If you add too much fertiliser and your plants will be soft and sappy. The result will be a lovely lunch for the pests and the need for you to spray. Feed your soil with garden compost and leaf-mould rather than using artificial fertilisers that are designed to feed only the plant. Feeding the soil rather than the plant will mean stronger growth and better resistance to pests and diseases. For organic gardeners there is also another very important tool in preventing pests and diseases, this is choosing varieties that have been bred for their pest and disease resistance.
• Barriers are the best way of reducing pest damage. Simply by covering your vegetables with a fine mesh you will stop them being attacked by flying pests. This works well for carrot rootfly and pea moth. Fine mesh is also a way of protecting your cabbages from just about everything. For example: flea beetles, leaf weevils, birds, cabbage white butterflies and white fly. Barriers include cabbage collars and bottle cloches. Placing a collar of carpet underlay around the neck of a young cabbage will prevent the cabbage root fly from laying its eggs at the base of the cabbage. Bottle cloches protect young plants from slugs and other leaf-nibblers
• Bottle cloche – Placing a bottle cloche, a clear plastic drinks bottle with the top and bottom removed, over newly planted vegetables will prevent them being eaten by slugs or anything else that takes a fancy to them. A simple cloche is easy to make and is an important tool to use when gardening early in the season.
• Chickenwire is always useful. Placing it over your newly sown peas can stop them being eaten by mice while they are germinating or being scratched up by cats. Wrap it around your flowering bulbs to prevent squirrels from digging them up.
• Netting can be very useful at preventing bird damage to fruit and vegetables. There is also a humming line that can be wound around canes criss-crossed over your vegetables to prevent bird attacks. Netting can also prevent cabbage white butterflies from laying their eggs on your brassicas.
• Barriers can also be used to prevent diseases. For example, peach leaf curl is a devastating fungus that can simply be prevented by placing a barrier of polythene sheeting over a trained peach tree in the winter. This simple barrier prevents the spores splashing up onto the plant.
• Slugs are most people’s worst enemy. Barriers of anything sharp and gritty are supposed to protect your tender plants, as is bran (they’re supposed to eat it and dehydrate). There are all sorts of products available for slug control on the organic market now. One that springs to mind is a band of copper that gives the slugs electric shocks.
• Traps are also used in garden pest control and there are many kinds of traps. Fly-paper, pheromones, floating row covers are a few such traps. Traps can be anything from beer traps for slugs to codling moth traps hung from your apple trees. Sticky traps are very popular with the organic gardener. A codling moth trap uses a pheromone placed on a sticky floor. The male moth is attracted to the trap thinking it is a female. On landing he gets stuck in the glue. There are similar traps for plum moths, too.
• One essential pest and disease control is crop rotation that involves dividing your vegetables into at least four groups that stay together each year but move onto the next part of the rotation every spring. The vegetables are grouped by family as well as similar feeding habits. Apart from being the best way to build soil fertility it is the most important factor in controlling the build up of pests and diseases.