Creepers & Crawlers
Things with legs
Things with mouths
Things with legs and mouths that eat your garden.
Things that invade your home
and generally drive you a little crazy.
Beetles, borers, caterpillars, grasshoppers, ants and more!
The creatures of the insect world have a place and function in the environment. Unfortunately, their territory often clashes with ours.
Here are some natural remedies to help you stay sane and encourage them to go play elsewhere.
Things with mouths
Things with legs and mouths that eat your garden.
Things that invade your home
and generally drive you a little crazy.
Beetles, borers, caterpillars, grasshoppers, ants and more!
The creatures of the insect world have a place and function in the environment. Unfortunately, their territory often clashes with ours.
Here are some natural remedies to help you stay sane and encourage them to go play elsewhere.
Ants
Ants are the hardest insects to exclude from any where. They will climb buildings, squeeze between the walls and appear in their millions, especially where you don't want them.
There are ants that respond to sweet baits and others that don't. Try and see what works best in your area.
There are ants that respond to sweet baits and others that don't. Try and see what works best in your area.
In the house:
Ants inside the house are usually searching for food and water unless their nests have been flooded and they are heading for higher, drier ground.
Prevent
Keeping surfaces clear of crumbs of food will help.
If they have been seen, you may need to sit honey jars,and sugar bowls in water to keep them away.
Remove & deter
Ants will not cross a trail of talcum powder sprinkled across entrances.
Ants have a sensitive sense of smell. A few drops of essential oil of eucalyptus or lavender on a damp mop over the floor or wiped over pantry shelves will keep most insects out. You will need to do it at least once a week when infestation is bad.
If you have ants that seek out sweetness, you can use a home made bait of 4 tablespoons icing sugar and 1 tablespoon of borax.
Mix 1 tablespoon of mixture with 1 cup of water. This will be enough for two shallow dishes which you can place near the ant trails.
Store outside in a screw top jar marked ant bait.
Lay fresh leaves of tansy in cupboards where ants have been seen.
Prevent
Keeping surfaces clear of crumbs of food will help.
If they have been seen, you may need to sit honey jars,and sugar bowls in water to keep them away.
Remove & deter
Ants will not cross a trail of talcum powder sprinkled across entrances.
Ants have a sensitive sense of smell. A few drops of essential oil of eucalyptus or lavender on a damp mop over the floor or wiped over pantry shelves will keep most insects out. You will need to do it at least once a week when infestation is bad.
If you have ants that seek out sweetness, you can use a home made bait of 4 tablespoons icing sugar and 1 tablespoon of borax.
Mix 1 tablespoon of mixture with 1 cup of water. This will be enough for two shallow dishes which you can place near the ant trails.
Store outside in a screw top jar marked ant bait.
Lay fresh leaves of tansy in cupboards where ants have been seen.
Outside:
Ant nests in the garden can kill plants and make gardening extremely unpleasant.
Ants will clog your irrigation in their hunt for water in summer and in winter they will take up residence their out of the rain. Anyone who has had to clear blocked micro sprinklers will tell you they don't taste good.
Prevent
Minimise their food sources.
Wrap your rubbish before it goes into the bin.
Keep your compost moist.
Pick up fallen fruit.
Wash animal feeding bowls daily.
Remove & deter
If ants have taken up residence underpavers or under your verandah, the best weapon is water.
A regular hosing will let them know that it is probably best for them to move away.
Protect your windows and doorways with a line of dry talcum powder or they will head indoors to get away from the water!
If they don't get the hint, follow the trail back to the nest and pour a kettle of boiling water down it two days in a row.
Plant deterrents for ants include marjoram, mint, oregano, rue and tansy. Plant them around your vegetable beds as most of them are invasive.
If you have plenty, crush few leaves and lay them in the beds. Old dried herbs from the kitchen are also useful sprinkled around.
Use bait as above, but place under shelter.
Ants will clog your irrigation in their hunt for water in summer and in winter they will take up residence their out of the rain. Anyone who has had to clear blocked micro sprinklers will tell you they don't taste good.
Prevent
Minimise their food sources.
Wrap your rubbish before it goes into the bin.
Keep your compost moist.
Pick up fallen fruit.
Wash animal feeding bowls daily.
Remove & deter
If ants have taken up residence underpavers or under your verandah, the best weapon is water.
A regular hosing will let them know that it is probably best for them to move away.
Protect your windows and doorways with a line of dry talcum powder or they will head indoors to get away from the water!
If they don't get the hint, follow the trail back to the nest and pour a kettle of boiling water down it two days in a row.
Plant deterrents for ants include marjoram, mint, oregano, rue and tansy. Plant them around your vegetable beds as most of them are invasive.
If you have plenty, crush few leaves and lay them in the beds. Old dried herbs from the kitchen are also useful sprinkled around.
Use bait as above, but place under shelter.
Twenty eight spot ladybird
These are one of the baddies of the ladybird world (the sort that would let their babies burn!) They have many spots, often orange in colour (henosepilachna spp). They are especially fond of the whole solanacae family, especially eggplant and cucurbits of whom rockmelon is their favourite.
Prevent
Allow a few trap plants of solanacae weeds to survive outside the vegie patch before planting -they will be attracted to these and you can begin controlling their numbers before they damage anything precious.
Remove & Deter
Fresh tansy leaves laid over small seedlings will trick them into staying away. Replace with fresh leaves every 3 or 4 days.
They tend to be dormant in the cooler hours. This makes it very easy to catch them.
Early each morning or at sunset, simply squish them between your fingers as they rest.
Baby beetles
These horrific little monsters are the larvae of Henosepiachna. I found them clustered on the stem of my trap plant, a nightshade. They will also eat your plants but they generally hide under the leaves, so check here too. These were heading off to pupate in the leaf mulch but were diverted to the chicken pen where the chickens feasted on them.
The bane of every gardener
Snails
Deter
Barriers are useful in keeping snails away.
They can range from an expensive galvanised strip along the edge of the garden be, bent over at a 45 degree angle where snails will congregate for you to harvest to fine sharp sand, wood ash or sawdust around plants. The organic barriers need to be kept dry so are difficult to maintain.
Snails avoid horseradish, pennyroyal, rue, sage and wormwood. Plant these near your green vegetables, use as a spray or lay fresh leaves around the base of new plants.I will never understand why they can happily munch unaffected , on rhubarb leaves.
Trap
Snails love beer. A simple trap can be made by burying a jam jar half full of beer at an angle near vulnerable plants. The snails will be attracted by the beer, fall in and drown happily. You will need to clean and replenish every few days or as needed.
Control
If you have room, get a couple of ducks and let them free range in your garden for an hour each day before they take themselves off to bed at sunset. Snails are the favourite food of ducks. Indian runners tend to be very gentle on your plants and are great to watch.
There are now some snail pellets on the market that are safe to all wildlife. They contain small amounts of iron and work by constipating the snails. the amount is too small to effect other wildlife. I have to store mine in a tin a the rats in the shed go wild for them. Scatter according to directions when planting seedlings. If you sprinkle around the garden boundaries during the winter months, you will greatly reduce the numbers of snails.
Handpicking. I do a snail run around my garden as the sun rises every few days in winter. The snails are often still out and about at this time. Looking under timber, in the holes in bricks and on the shady side of garden beds. They then are fed to my chickens, who fight over who gets to eat them!
Children are excited at the idea of spotlighting snails. Take them out after dark, armed with a torch and bucket on a snail hunt. A reward of a few cents a snail brings the best results.
My most successful snail control was using snail pepper during a massive invasion a few years ago when I was picking up over fifty snails from a small area every day for weeks. Snail Peppers are a Bio Dynamic preparation that works by affecting the fertility of the snails. It is made with snails harvested then burnt to charcoal which is ground and made into a homeopathic tincture. This all needs to be carried out at particular astrological times, contact your local group to find out more. It is messy but I found it really worked here and the snails have never reached those numbers again.
Barriers are useful in keeping snails away.
They can range from an expensive galvanised strip along the edge of the garden be, bent over at a 45 degree angle where snails will congregate for you to harvest to fine sharp sand, wood ash or sawdust around plants. The organic barriers need to be kept dry so are difficult to maintain.
Snails avoid horseradish, pennyroyal, rue, sage and wormwood. Plant these near your green vegetables, use as a spray or lay fresh leaves around the base of new plants.I will never understand why they can happily munch unaffected , on rhubarb leaves.
Trap
Snails love beer. A simple trap can be made by burying a jam jar half full of beer at an angle near vulnerable plants. The snails will be attracted by the beer, fall in and drown happily. You will need to clean and replenish every few days or as needed.
Control
If you have room, get a couple of ducks and let them free range in your garden for an hour each day before they take themselves off to bed at sunset. Snails are the favourite food of ducks. Indian runners tend to be very gentle on your plants and are great to watch.
There are now some snail pellets on the market that are safe to all wildlife. They contain small amounts of iron and work by constipating the snails. the amount is too small to effect other wildlife. I have to store mine in a tin a the rats in the shed go wild for them. Scatter according to directions when planting seedlings. If you sprinkle around the garden boundaries during the winter months, you will greatly reduce the numbers of snails.
Handpicking. I do a snail run around my garden as the sun rises every few days in winter. The snails are often still out and about at this time. Looking under timber, in the holes in bricks and on the shady side of garden beds. They then are fed to my chickens, who fight over who gets to eat them!
Children are excited at the idea of spotlighting snails. Take them out after dark, armed with a torch and bucket on a snail hunt. A reward of a few cents a snail brings the best results.
My most successful snail control was using snail pepper during a massive invasion a few years ago when I was picking up over fifty snails from a small area every day for weeks. Snail Peppers are a Bio Dynamic preparation that works by affecting the fertility of the snails. It is made with snails harvested then burnt to charcoal which is ground and made into a homeopathic tincture. This all needs to be carried out at particular astrological times, contact your local group to find out more. It is messy but I found it really worked here and the snails have never reached those numbers again.
