When gardening organically, there are several ways to manage pests without the use of chemicals. Occasionally, the need arises for the use of an organic pesticide. Here are explanations of some of the more common options as well as some tips for using them effectively.
What Is Eating Holes In My Leaves?
What could be eating the leaves off my cantaloupes and beets?
Keeping Birds from Eating Cherries
What can I use to keep birds from eating my cherries before I have a chance to taste them. I tried pie plates, flags, etc. (anything shines). Even me standing on the ladder in the middle of branches they come to have their meal. And I look like a scarecrow, mind you. I know you'll have an answer to this problem. I notice other people are having the same trouble with cherry trees.
Adult cockroaches are medium-sized insects, with a broad, flat shape and long antennae. Often confused with beetles, the cockroach's wings are membranous and they lack the thick, hard forewing of beetles.
Insect guide for Chinch Bugs. This fast moving little bug is 3/16 to 1/8 of an inch long, with a black body and white, red or brown wings. Adults chinch bugs lay eggs in the soil in the spring after overwintering in the grass. The eggs hatch into small, legless nymphs that are pinkish in color and have a white band across their back.
Insect guide for Leafminers. These pale green or black, stubby little maggots tunnel through leaves and cannot be seen with the naked eye, but the visible spaghetti-like patterns on the topsides of leaves are easy to identify.
There are many species of leafhoppers. Some are brown or green in color, while others are green and red with white markings. Look for slender 1/8-inch long wedge-shaped bugs that jump or fly when disturbed.
Gypsy Moths are usually only seen around mid-summer. The male moths are a grayish brown color and can fly. The female moths cannot fly, are larger in size and have a whitish color with black markings.
Garden Insects: Japanese Beetles
Controlling Japanese Beetles. Look for metallic blue-green, long-legged beetles with coppery-colored wing covers. Adults lay eggs from June through August. Eggs hatch into fat white, comma-shaped grubs with brownish-orange heads.
Garden Insects: Harlequin Bugs
Harlequin Bugs cause plants to wilt, turn brown and die by literally "sucking the juices right out of them."
Garden Insects: Imported Cabbage Worms
Look for 1-inch long, velvety green caterpillars with a yellow stripe down their back. The Imported Cabbage Worm butterfly is white with dark wing spots and A 1 1/4 inch wingspan. The female butterflies are very active during the day and lay hundreds of yellow-colored eggs on the undersides of leaves.
There are several hundred species of grasshoppers, but only a handful that cause Damage to crops and ornamental plants. Many common garden species are 1-2 inches in length and gray, green or brown in color.
Information about Bagworms. Bagworms are small, dirt-brown colored caterpillars, which are sometimes difficult to see.
Garden Insects: Armyworms (Beet & Fall Armyworms)
Information about Armyworms (Beet & Fall Armyworms). Although there are many species of this pest, beet and fall armyworms are the most common species in the backyard garden.
Apple maggots are legless, yellow-white in color and about 1/4 inch to 3/8 inch in size. Maggots hatch from eggs laid on the fruits by the parent flies. The mature maggots fall to the ground where they pupate and overwinter and emerge as adult flies the following June.
Also referred to as plant lice, aphids are 1/32 to 1/8 inch long, pear-shaped sucking insects. They are soft-bodied and may or may not have wings. Aphids come in black, green, pink, red, gray and yellow, and some have a wooly, white coating.
A guide to controlling ants in the garden.
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