For decades gardeners have tried many ways to rid their gardens of snails and other pests, but every year they appear again! Try these organic methods for deterring these creatures from visiting your garden.
Olwethu Laho (30), an animal scientist, farmer, and agripreneur from Cofimvaba in the Eastern Cape, believes that spraying pests with a coffee solution is the greatest method, especially fruit and vegetables.
“Because coffee is beneficial for human consumption, if you combine water with coffee, you can spray any crop and it is safe for plants.
“The greatest aspect is that, unlike other pesticides, you won’t have to wait multiple days before eating your garden food.”
Laho goes on to say that not all bugs are harmful; in fact, some are useful, like slugs and snails. “Slugs and snails assist to clean up gardens by devouring dead plants.”
“And almost all common garden snails and slugs (except the uniquely destructive field slug, Deroceras reticulatum), prefer decomposing plants to living plants, however the population must not be too much as they may also cause major damage to your garden.”
Laho adds, “Pests are drawn to slums and other gloomy areas. Another factor to consider is how you water your garden; if you overwater it, the chances of pest infestation are extremely high.”
Controlling pests
Pests, according to Steven Barnard of FarmerKidz and Garden of Life, love to devour gardens and may be quite bothersome. He says that the first thing you should do is get and put ladybugs in your garden because they love to eat garden pests.
“The organic garlic and soap insect spray is effective against aphids, lace bugs, leafhoppers, mealy bugs, spider mites, and other soft-bodied pests that attack directly.”
According to Barnard, the most crucial thing is to rotate your crops according to the crop rotation schedule.
Herbicide alternatives
He recommends that you leave intervals between your vegetable tyres to allow for wind passage, and that you totally remove dead plants and eliminate them rather than use herbicides.
“Another thing to remember is to avoid harvesting your veggies when they are still moist. Water your crops by putting water into the bottles in the veggie tyres rather than watering from overhead. ”
A recipe by Farmer Kidz to get rid of pests in your garden
Spray fungicide or powdery mildew.
Use the following ingredients and follow the instructions:
5 litres of water, 3 tablespoons of baking soda, 1 tablespoon bleach, and 1 teaspoon dishwashing liquid.
Instructions:
- Snip and remove leaves that are worst affected.
- Combine the ingredients with the water.
- Spray the tops and undersides of the remaining leaves.
- Apply a heavier dose to leaves that show signs of infection, and only lightly to leaves that aren’t infected. Bleach can damage and change the colour of the leaves.
- It is extremely important to not use too much bleach. Use no more than 1 part bleach to 10 parts water.
- We hesitate recommending the use of bleach as it can harm your plants if too much is applied. Use it at your own risk.
