Ants, snails, slugs, and other insects can become pests in your garden. These insects can damage young plants and vegetables because that is their preferred food.
While we don’t want this creepy crawlies in our gardens, eating our veggies, using pesticides to get rid of these pests can make your food taste like chemicals and can be harmful to your health.
The best way to get rid of insect pests is by promoting their natural predators.
NATURAL WAYS TO GET RID OF ANTS
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Natural pest control methods emphasize working along with nature, not against it. Using pesticides can damage your health when you breathe it in, eat it on your vegetables, or contaminate the water table.
Some of the ways to control garden insect pests are:
NATURAL PREDATORS
To control the bad-insect population, you will need a healthy number of predators in your garden. Birds, toads, garden snakes, ground beetles, garden spiders, and ladybugs are the best defense against damaging insects.
Organic gardening is a good way to encourage the presence of these creatures. Many of the insects are attracted to pollen and nectar-producing flowers. Birds and frogs are attracted by water sources and shelter.
BARRIERS
Some insects can be stopped from climbing up plants with the use of barriers. These come in a wide variety and can be used to separate portions of your garden from other parts or actually form a ring around each plant.
Snails especially are repelled by copper and crumbled egg shells.
REPELLENTS
There are a variety of home-remedy type repellents that are popularly used. These have varying effects, but many seem to do a good job. These repellents include oils, soaps, hot pepper juice, garlic, and tobacco.
DECOYS
Some insects feed on your favorite flowers or vegetables because it’s the tastiest item in your garden. There are, however, less desirable plants that they often prefer.
To draw slugs away from your garden, for example, plant a large patch of red clover.
TRAPS
Some insects can be successfully trapped. Slugs and snails are easily drowned in beer traps. Sticky strips can trap a number of unwanted insects, but can also kill the good ones.
PEST-SPECIFIC TREATMENT
There are as many natural pest treatments as there are pests. Each one is designed to target only the insect you want to get rid of. These can be purchased at organic gardening centers.
While using chemical pesticides may be a quick and relatively easy solution to insect pests, it often does more harm than good. Choose a natural method to prevent or draw away snails, slugs, caterpillars, and other harmful insects.
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