The year of the pest

Hi All,

i'm just wondering what's the best way to try and reduce the number of pests in my garden. This year I seem to have loads and i've not done so in previous years.
It would be good if someone can post some info of how to reduce them organically so that others like myself can follow.

Slugs and snails. I seem to be battling an endless number of them at the moment. What's the best way to dispose of them or reduce the numbers. I've heard of nematodes being used. Do they work and stop new ones coming in or is it something you have to keep re applying.?My garden is quite large with a polytunnel and several cold frames so i'm guessing as an option it could be quite expensive?

Next are fungus gnat larvae. I have been plagued by these for the last couple of years and can't seem to eradicate them. I've tried bug sprays as a last resort, sticky traps etc. But nothing seems to work they just seem quite content on destroying my plants and seedlings. Has anyone else had the same problem?

Finally Aphids, despite using a spray bottle of soapy water I don't seem to be dealing with them, they just seem to be taking hold at the moment.

Thanks guys, hope you can help me on this one.

 

Hi Ben

I have also been plagued by slugs and snails this year especially over the last couple of weeks since we have had more rain.I am trying not to use slug pellets as we have a resident hedgehog and am worried about poisoning it so I have been going out in between the rain showers and collecting up as many of the little blighters as I can and putting them in my grey recycling bin that has a little garden waste in the bottom of it.Over the last two weeks I must have collected around 150 (mainly snails)so know where you are coming from.

I have never tried the Nematodes as I believe with some of those products to work the temperature has to be correct for them to be activated and also if like me you have a big problem,you will need loads of Nematodes to control them plus I think they only work for so many weeks of if the temperature changes then they stop working.

For aphid control I have been lucky in having a nest box full of blue tits so the parents have been busy supplementing the usual food of caterpillars with aphids.I have also had house sparrows going through my roses doing the same thing and also a couple of months ago had a wren furaging amongst my pyracantha doing the same thing in searching for pests,so I think one answer would be to try and invite as many natural predators into the garden by putting out bird feeders/bird tables to encourage birds into the garden which will in return help you out.Where we used to live we had a resident Song Thrush so never had a snail problem and I think my hedgehog doesn't like them or slugs,but preferes the cat food I put out instead

Fungus gnats and their larvae are usually due to the compost being too wet so try to keep the compost a little bit drier and see if that helps.Also the fungus gnats might already be in the compost when you bought it,and then with the added water at watering times could expand the problem.

Hope some of this info is a help to you

 

I've been lucky to have loads of lady bird larvae over the last month sorting out the aphids.

However I too have been inundated with slugs, snails and other leaf destroyers. I only have a tiny garden in Clapham, London and with the concentration so high, very little is surviving the onslaught!

I won't use slug pellets because of my cat and birds. So I've tried nematodes, I don't think they have done anything. What has worked is beer traps and hand collecting and chucking into the traps. Every time I put down the traps, the next day I've caught a few big fat slugs and some snails. They work for small gardens and I finally seem to be on top of the population.

Unfortunately, there are tonnes of other insects eating everything. I've seen some caterpillars but not all of the culprits.

The downside to having a cat is lack of birds to eat everything...

I don't want all insects to go, I just want the garden to balance out and for the younger plants to reach adulthood before they're decimated.


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I don't have a problem with slugs and snails but do have a lot of caterpillars. Also something is munching the heads off some plants - geraniums, oxalis and ranunculus so far have all been beheaded plus some leaves of bulbs have also been attacked. What creature would do that? They've been totally demolished

 

Hmm, small climbing snails did that to my clematis. Could be birds though?


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I tried soapy water spray on my new roses.., they were covered in green and black fly, but had no effect, after consulting the ultimate expert (google) I tried half mouth wash half water in a spray bottle and after a week they are clear so maybe worth a go?

 

I don't have a 'problem' so far, well not anything that a pair of fingers cannot sort out, but I also use a soapy spray but with a little veg oil added. However, I am always open to new ideas.

Lets see if SWMBO, misses the mouthwash.....

 

Snailpocalypse happening in my garden tonight - I've just done an hour of collecting and popping in beer traps. To give you an idea of how bad it is, our garden is about 6 metres square, if that.

 

Hi i have had a serious problem with fungus gnats as they killed two mango plants and a pineapple :(
If you still have the problem try spraying or watering your plants with peppermint tea diluted with water. I know it sounds odd but i did it a couple of times and it reduced the numbers from 10 coming off each pot to about 2 in my whole room.
Also I found with aphids if you get rid of the ants guarding/farming them then natural predators will kill most of them.
Hope this helped

 

+1 for beer traps. At least the slimeys die happy Fungus gnats have been a nightmare over the last couple of years so I mixed my own seed-sowing compost this year. Apparently they like lots of badly-decomposed woody organic matter and now that commercial composts contain so much shredded bark, they revel in it! I used peat, sand and perlite, with a little sieved FYM, disinfected all the pots and trays, and so far not a sign of any fungus gnats!
Pheromone traps at the ready for the fruit trees.
The parasitic wasp that colonises aphid larvae is fantastic! It's not so heat-dependant as some organic controls and did a good job for 5 years in the UK, even moving out of the greenhouse and doing it's stuff in the garden.

 

I have a major slug problem in my garden, even though my hens eat them it seems to be impossible to keep on top of them! I daren't put slug pellets down because of my hens. I'm going to try beer traps this year but can anyone suggest anything else I could try?

 

You could try nematodes? I tried it once and can't say I could see a difference.

Unfortunately, the only things I've found that work are the pellets or the liquid form of poison. They really bring the numbers down. But you really do have to be careful with pets or wildlife.

Otherwise, hand picking, beer traps and as many copper barriers as possible to stop the buggers.


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Thanks JackJJW, I've looked at nematodes in the past but never actually bought any, don't you have to keep applying it all year?? I'm going down the beer trap route at least as a start. The slugs are so bad this year they literally are sliding up the walls on the house at night! Its totally disgusting! My patio is covered with the Buggars! A friend said I need to stamp on them but that's just too horrid for me!

 

You could try sprinkling them with salt, Beckie. It's supposed to dehydrate them, I think. Probably less harmful to other creatures than slug pellets!

 

Personally if I were you then, I would use the liquid one and spray it on walls as long as it's not somewhere that it can run down to where the chickens are and try nematodes.

Any solution will need to be repeated as slugs reproduce very quickly.


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