Organic Insect & Pest Control

Insect & Pest Control

The best overall yard and garden insect control is provided by birds, so it's a great idea to attract them - with birdbaths, feeders, and flowers. For rabbits, I just plant extra vegetables to keep them happy. And my dogs keep the adorable, garden-destroying groundhog away.

Other garden pests can also be managed very effectively without chemical sprays and dusts, which are unhealthy for lots of living things and often ineffective, in any event.

My most serious garden problems have been 1) whiteflies and 2) slugs. Whiteflies are the worst, and can destroy tomato plants very quickly if left "untreated". I've been whitefly-free in recent years, thankfully!

My Remedies for Garden Slugs and Whiteflies

Slugs

Place jar lids or slug "bars" here and there in the garden and fill with beer. Slug bars can be purchased at Gardener's Supply and other places. They look nicer than jar lids but lids work fine, too.

Empty out any dead slugs periodically and refill the traps with beer. If the beer seems to be evaporating very quickly, it may be that your dog is enjoying the brew, in which case, you'll want to suspend slug-control efforts or jury-rig a way to cover the containers with wire mesh. The lids or bars are most effective when "buried" a little so that slugs don't have to crawl up but, rather, into a lake of beer.

Whiteflies

The first line of defense is a wonderful beneficial insect, the green lacewing, which eats whitefly eggs. You can buy lacewings at GardensAlive. Lady bugs are helpful, too, and can be purchased at GardensAlive and Henry Fields.

Once infested (pray not!), you can keep the problem under control with water or a garlic-water mix.

Simply washing off tomato leaves with water squirted from the hose will get rid of whiteflies but you must do this daily, ideally, and you can't do it under drought restrictions. (Be sure to squirt the tops and bottoms of leaves.)

A better treatment is to crush garlic cloves and mix with a gallon or two of water in your watering can. Let the mixture "ferment" for awhile, then stir it up just before use. Then, shower and "wash" each tomato leaf by hand with the mixture. This must be repeated frequently and is time consuming, but it works, and is better than losing your tomato crop. Your garden will smell like garlic, which takes some getting used to, but it's not a bad smell.

Whether or not you've had a whitefly problem, you should plant tomatoes in a different spot next year, even if it is just in a different and somewhat distant area of the garden.

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