When your precious crops are damaged by pests, it can be disheartening. The truth is, only a tiny proportion of the insects living in your garden can be considered pests. The vast majority are actually beneficial from a human perspective.

Even the ‘pests’ may be providing some positive benefit to your garden ecosystem: attracting predators, pruning plants, or providing a free source of chook food.

In most cases, pesticides aren’t necessary to manage pests. There are a number of low-cost natural solutions that are safer for you and your family, and healthier for the living, breathing ecosystem that makes up your garden.

The problem with pesticides

Conventional pest management tells us to use chemical pesticides to eradicate the problem. While they might at first seem like a quick, powerful way to deal with an issue, pesticides (even organic and natural pesticides) have a long list of drawbacks.

• Aren’t selective – they kill more than the pest you’re after, often killing beneficial insects as well. 

• Not healthy for plants or soil. 

• Can poison children, pets and the plants we eat, making their way into our bodies and causing serious illness.

• Expensive, require a lot of energy to create and take a lot of time to implement.

• Ineffective – many pests have adapted to survive pesticides and can build up immunity over a couple of generations.

Why do I have a pest problem in my garden?

Pests are simply species that are out of balance. Pest build-up tells us there is something out of balance in our garden system. Being able to identify pests can help us restore balance and bring health back into our gardens.

Here are some common causes of pest infestations:

• Poor plant nutrition – unhealthy plants are more susceptible to pests.

• Monocultures – single-plant crops allow pests and disease to spread rapidly by giving them a steady supply of food.

• Wrong conditions – planting crops in a sub-optimal area, or growing them out of their usual season, makes them more susceptible to pests.

• Feeding and watering too much – this makes the plants sappy and particularly attractive to pests. 

• Killing predators – predators naturally keep pest populations in check. When, for example, we use non-selective pesticides, we kill predators as well as pests.

• You have the only garden around – when your neighbours aren’t gardening, your garden is more vulnerable to pests!

How to deal with garden pests without using pesticides 

Here are 10 awesome natural methods for dealing with pests and restoring balance in your garden ecosystem.

1. Select pest resistant seed varieties

Cherry tomatoes, for example, are more pest resistant than the larger tomato varieties. 

If you plant a variety that’s badly attacked, select another variety next season. When you find a variety that thrives in your garden, save the seeds from the strongest, healthiest plants for next season.

If you want to save seeds, steer clear from hybrid varieties. Hybrid seeds do not breed true to type – the seeds you save from a hybrid plant won’t grow plants of the same genetic quality.

Go forheirloom seeds instead. With heirloom seeds, you can be confident the seeds you save will produce the same plants generation after generation.

2. Maintain healthy plants

Healthy plants are more resistant to pests and diseases, just like us humans. Unhealthy, malnourished and under watered plants are more vulnerable. So making sure your plants are healthy and resilient is the first step to prevention.

One great way to give your plants a boost in immunity is to feed them a seaweed solution made frompowdered kelp and water. 

3. Practice companion planting

Some plants are known to attract or repel insects, making them great companions to your valuable crops. Plant these powerful plants alongside your edible crops for a healthy and diverse garden bed.

Examples include: 

• Basil to repel flies, aphids, whitefly, flies, mosquitoes

• Marigold to kill nematodes with a root exudate and attract ladybirds, hoverflies and butterflies

• Nasturtiums to repel aphids and white fly, and act as a decoy for brassicas

• Yarrow to attract predatory insects such as lacewings, ladybirds, hoverflies and parasitic wasps

4. Attract natural predators

When there are more natural predators in your garden, pest populations will naturally stay in check. That’s one of the reasons why spraying pesticides can actually make pest problems worse in the long run.

Make your garden a place where predators feel invited by providing food, water, habitat and safety.

Some great ways to do so include: 

• Growing plants that provide a source of food for predators, including annual flowers, nectar- rich trees and flowering perennials.

• Allowing some of your vegetables to flower and go to seed.

• Install a pond, growing wetland plants and placing stones and logs around it.

• Put out a bird bath or shallow dishes of water around your garden.

• Have sections of your garden which have rocks, logs and wood chips to provide habitat for lizards, centipedes and spiders.

• Install insect hotels and bird houses to provide habitat for predators.

5. Plant sacrificial crops

Planting a crop that’s particularly desirable to pests can lure them away from the crops you want to protect. 

Examples include:

• Nasturtiums to lure aphids, whitefly & cabbage moth.

• Marigolds to lure root knot nematodes. 

• Sunflowers to lure green vegetable bugs. 

• Amaranth to lure caterpillars.

6. Put physical barriers in place

Some great examples of physical barriers to stop pests include:

• Metal cloche or a DIY barrier made from cardboard or a tin can around vulnerable seedlings.

• Copper tape around pots and garden beds to stop slugs and snails.

• Netting over fruit trees or bagging individual fruit.

• Exclusion nets over a garden bed.

7. Leave traps

Some ways to use traps in your garden include:

• Leaving milk and beer traps to attract slugs and snails

• Hanging Cera Trap to attract fruitfly.

• Set up a light trap over a frog pond where insects will be attracted, fall into the pond and become food for fish or frogs.

8. Try clay sprays

If you’re growing fruit trees, clay sprays are a good natural method of protecting your crops from pests. Spray Kaolin Clay or Citrus Gall Wasp Clay Spray over the leaves and bark of your fruit trees. The clay clogs the mouth of pests making it difficult to lay eggs.

9. Introduce ladybirds into your garden

Ladybird larvae are voracious predators for a number of garden pests including aphids, scale and mealy bugs. In late winter through spring we sell ladybird eggs at our store in Vic Park. When the eggs are ready to hatch, the paper they’re on can be pegged to a plant suffering from a pest infestation. As the larvae emerge, they hungrily devour any food source in their near vicinity. 

10. Last resort: Natural pesticides

Selecting the least toxic options first, it may be necessary to use substances to kill or repel pests. Apply only when needed rather than reaching for the spray bottle as a first line of defence.

Keep in mind that even organic and natural pesticides may kill beneficial insects as well as the pest you’re targeting, so always spot test and watch the results before applying widely.

Some natural pesticides include:

• Garlic & chilli spray

• Soap & oil spray

• Neem oil

• Eco-Oil Organic Insecticide

Going natural with your pest management is a powerful choice

All of us can make simple yet significant contributions to protect the health of humans and our planet. Choosing natural solutions when it comes to pest management is an awesome place to start. 

Shop ourNatural Pest Management products.

 

Resources & References:

• Earth Restorer’s Guide to Permaculture by Rosemary Morrow 

• Organic Vegetable Gardening by Annette McFarlane

• The Permaculture Home Garden by Linda Woodrow

• Sustainable Gardening Australia website