Friends and Foes of the Gardener – look deeply they are everywhere

Let me define my terms a bit. The friends of the gardener can be very extensive and are both organic and inorganic – that is they can be insects, birds, amphibians (organic) and minerals and the elements – rain, sun and wind – (inorganic). These all provide an important benefit to the gardener’s plant life. Unfortunately, the foes of the gardener are just as extensive and are both organic and inorganic – that is to say that they are insects, birds, rodents (organic) and mineral and the elements – rain, sun and wind – (inorganic).  The real role of the gardener is to learn how to balance all of these environmental influences.

Gardening without interference from unwanted garden insect pests, would certainly make gardening a simpler matter. However we must constantly be aware of these small uninvited visitors that can create some massive havoc when left unaddressed.

Just as human diseases can often be avoided by healthful solutions, infestations of garden pests can be reduced by strict garden hygiene. There are places and conditions that promote the breeding of insects. I don’t think a compost pile is the culprit since it is such a small part of the gardens environment, but look to unkempt, uncared for locations that could invite trouble.

The environment naturally provides the friends of the gardener for keeping the foes of the gardener under control.

• The continual stirring up of the soil by worms can be an aid in keeping the dirt open to air and water.
• Many of our common wild birds are great for birdwatching but they also feed on insect pests. The sparrows, robins, chickadees, meadow larks and orioles are all examples of birds that assist in some way.
• Some insects nourish themselves on various other damaging insects. Some types of ladybugs do this good action. The ichneumon-fly assists also.
• Toads are miracles in the variety of insects they can feed on at a single meal. The toad warrants very kind treatment from us all.

Every gardener should try to make his or her backyard garden into a spot attractive to birds and toads. A great birdhouse, grain sprinkled about during the early springtime, a water-place, are invitations for birds to stay a while in your garden.

If you want to encourage toads, fix things up for them as well. Throughout a sizzling summer day a toad loves to slumber in the shade. By night time he is ready to eat live food. How can one “fix up” for toads? Well, one thing to do is to prepare a retreat, peaceful, shaded and moist. A few stones of different sizes beneath the shade of a bush, adding a carpeting of damp leaves, would appear quite fine to a toad.

Another beneficial helper is the Praying Mantis. Each egg sack provides between 100 and 300 mantids (a varying term for the mantis) which are perfect for natural pest control. You can raise them yourself by purchasing praying mantis egg sacks.

There are two common classes of insect pests

They are known by the way each performs its function:

• One will gnaw at the plant actually taking bits of it into its system. This sort of insect pest has a mouth fitted to accomplish this work. Grasshoppers and caterpillars tend to be of this sort.
• The other variety sucks the juices from a plant. This, in certain ways, is the worst type. Plant lice fit in here, as do mosquitoes, which prey on us all. All of the scale insects fasten themselves on plants, and suck out the life of the plants.

Exactly how will we deal with these kinds of insect pests?

The question at hand is “How can I tell what insect has been doing the damage?”

Apart from seeing the insect itself, you will be able to tell, to some extent, by what the damage is. It isn’t always easy to see the insect but seeing what their hungry appetites cause can quickly ruin a crop, no less your day. I had cutworms one season and never saw one. I noticed only their influence on my garden. If stalks of tender vegetation are eaten clean off, you can be pretty sure the cutworm is aboard.

What does one look like? Well, that is a tough question simply because his family is a huge one. If you see sometime a grayish striped caterpillar, you know you have a cutworm. But because of its habit of relaxing in the ground during the day and working by night, it is not easy to catch sight of one. The cutworm is around from the start of the growing season feeding on flower stalks such as the hyacinth. Then, when the peas come up, a bit later on, the culprit is ready for them. An excellent way to block them off is to put paper collars, or tin ones, around the plants. These collars ought to be about an inch away from the plant.

These gnawing guys might be treated with poison sprayed or sprinkled on the plants and the insect ingests. The Bordeaux mixture, a liquid composed of hydrated lime, copper sulfate, and water, was one of the earliest fungicides, is that kind of poison used on plants.

For the suckers, it is best attack these pests directly. Therefore certain insecticides, as they are called, are sprayed on the plant to fall on the insect. The process here usually causes a dehydration of the insect which ultimately kills them.

Sometimes we are much troubled with underground insects at work. You have often seen a garden covered with ant hills. Listed here is a treatment, but one of which you have to use caution.

Of course, plant lice tend to be more widespread. Those we see are generally green in color. But they could possibly be red, yellow or brown. Lice are easy enough to locate since they are often clinging on their host. As sucking insects they need to hang on to nearby a plant for food, and one is fairly certain to locate them. But the biting insects work, then go conceal themselves. That makes them a great deal harder to deal with.

Rose slugs do great damage to the rose bushes. They eat out the body of the leaves, so that only the veining remains. They’re soft-bodied, green above and yellow underneath.

A beetle, the striped beetle, attacks small melons and squash leaves. It eats the leaf by riddling out holes in it. This particular beetle, as its name indicates, is striped. The back is black with yellow stripes running lengthwise.

And then there are the slugs. The slug will devour virtually any garden plant, whether it is a flower or a vegetable. They lay a lot of eggs in aged waste heaps. Can you understand the good of cleaning up garbage? The slugs do more damage in the garden than just about any other insect pest. How will you find these insidious pests? They are quite likely to hide near the plants they are feeding on. There is a simple tip for bringing them to the surface of the ground in the daytime. They snooze throughout the day beneath the ground. So water the ground with a bit of good clean lime water. This should most likely irritate them and from there you can pluck them out.

These common pests usually attack many kinds of plants, but there are some pests that attack specific plants. And that is frustrating, isn’t it? Beans, for example, have pests of their very own; and so do potatoes and cabbages. In fact, your vegetable garden has a many assorted residents. While the flower garden has lice, which are certainly annoying, cutworms and slugs and ants that increase in number as the season progresses, it is probably most disheartening when they take control of your vegetable garden. If we were growing fruit to any extent, perhaps the vegetable garden would need to bow in favor of the fruit garden.

The list of garden insect pests goes on, from the tomato worm to the squash bug to the potato bug and on and on. We, as members further up the food chain, must look to the more natural way of dealing effectively with these nemeses. I hope that I have alerted you to some of the most effective methods of insect control.

Learn more about the friends of the gardener and foes of the gardener.