January 4th, 2023 Dogmatic Pest Control Theories

 

My one and only New Year's Resolution for 2023 is Step Two of the Grand Plan: to make the Farm profitable through production of food.

We made the Farm self-sustaining a little over one year ago and this meant no longer augmenting our income with savings. But this year is about making the future of the Farm more profitable so that we can begin the massive improvements we have been working toward for nearly eight years. Step One of the Grand Plan was to build the Farmhouse and we did that last year. Step Two is to build a Farm Business. Step Three is all about hospitality and creating a wedding venue in the future.

Our first year Step Two goal is to earn $25,000 in cash sales. Since we assume we will earn about a dollar a pound on produce then we will need to sell 25,000 pounds. But this level of efficiency is not likely to happen right away. Instead, we are assuming that we will need to grow nearly double this amount in order to find the highest quality goods, then preserve or donate the rest. The problems are many in reaching this level of growing things and many more in finding a way to sell it all when we succeed.

Of the things we have learned in our Farming practice so far I think getting rid of pests is perhaps the most important. In our second year of planting we found Squirrels, Gophers, Rabbits, Rats, and Mice all were very happy to come in and eat anything we had growing. We lost our entire crop that year as we learned to deter rodents and shoot straight. Last year all we had on the Farm were Chipmunks and a few field rats, so the problem wasn't too large to handle and we were able to sell a bunch of our production. But, even as we succeeded in getting the mammals under control, we found that insects began taking their place.

Cucumber Beetles

There are a great many insects that can harm crops. Last year we had Cucumber Beetles, Japanese Beetles, Flea Beetles, and a few grubs, but there were doubtless many more we didn't look for.  There are Ants, but they didn't come into the garden much. You might see the scope of the problem we will face as we expand our gardens this year.  

Of particular concern are the Beetles since they nest and over-Winter in plant debris. Since we are importing hundreds of yards of plant debris as part of building a no-till farm, we are likely going to give a home to huge numbers of beetles.  

Japanese Beetles

Adult Beetles have few natural predators and many have chemical defenses so birds usually stay away from them. Almost all have significant jumping and flying abilities too, so they are hard to catch. As we plan for the Spring we are spending quite a bit of time on the problem of Beetle eradication and prevention. As is turns out there are quite a few ways to get the job done in an organic garden. We will likely use them all. The first thing we can do is to put the right plants in the right places. 

If you put all of a Beetle's favorite food in one row the numbers will increase and soon the wee beasties will finish off the crop and need to find substitute food. One way to plant right is to use barrier plants, things that stop the beetles from moving from row to row and finding new food to eat. We will plant our rows with the following in mind.

• Marigold is a plant we have been using since beginning to grow stuff. It gives off an odor which most mammals, and quite a few bugs, tend to avoid. Marigold also gives Bumbler Bees a great place to sleep at night, so pollinator populations tend to increase in number. Marigolds are cheap, fast growing, and long flowering plants which look great in rows which border the larger gardens. We usually put in around a hundred Marigolds, this year we will put in around one-thousand as we expand our growing spaces. 
• Nasturtium is a plant I put in during year one of planting, but haven't used in any year since.  Nasturtium is a different sort of barrier plant, the bug attractive sort which tend to bring insect to one spot. In the first year I thought Nasturtiums didn't do well here so we gave up on growing it.  But after reading up on the subject we found that bugs loved them. They ate them down to nothing ahead of the plants growing out and before moving on to other sorts of plants.   There are other plants that attract bugs too. Radishes and Kale haven't done well here, for the same reason as the Nasturtiums didn't.  We are planning to plant at least one large row of Nasturtium in each larger garden bed, then treat the one row with Diatomaceous Earth once a week to kill off those bugs that have been drawn to it.  
• Diatomaceous Earth is a natural pesticide, it gets into the joints of bugs' exoskeletons and they simply stop moving around until they die off.  But care must be taken even in using this relatively innocent dust because Diatomaceous Earth also kills off beneficial bugs. We will restrict its use to these Nasturtium beds and then dust other plants only if we find a problem.
• Onions, Chives, and Garlic, all form a barrier to certain insects. We always grow these but now they will become border plants to hold back pests. These will be grown as "companion" plants along side of potatoes, beans, and tomatoes. Some plants simply do better near some other plants. I have a few charts describing these relationships and so we will plan accordingly. 
• Many herbs also deter insects. Oregano, Cilantro, Dill, Rosemary, and Basil all can deter insects, some have insecticidal properties.  Dill and Thyme can prevent some insects from laying eggs.

Cutworms

So it seems safe to say that planning to put the right plants in the right places might make things go along a bit easier. But there is a second way to keep buggy populations down: bringing in some good bugs to eat the bad ones. 

• Nematodes are non-segmented microscopic worms that hunt down many pesky bugs while the pesky things are in their larval stage. Nematodes invade their evil larval guts and eat them from the inside out. Some larvae, of some bugs, infesting root systems and killing the plants from below. Some adult Pests eat leaves and stunt growth from above. Putting a few billion Nematodes on the garden in Spring will help to kill off the larvae and prevent the adults from laying eggs in the soil.  
• A large number of different varieties of Nematodes are available, cheap, and easy to find, and these things come in very large quantities. You put them out using a garden sprayer and they breed and persist in the soil so long as the bad bugs are around to eat.
• Ladybugs and lace wing flies eat aphids, so they can be bought to release into the gardens, or encouraged to come in from the wild. We usually have a lot of ladybugs in Summer and we don't seem to have much of an aphid problem so far, so we are not likely to buy these predator insects this year. 
• Our Ducks and Chickens all like a good snack and many bad bugs, like houseflies, slugs, and snails make good duck food.

Aphids

The third way is to use insecticidal soap sprayed directly on the bugs. This is mostly a few tablespoons of detergent soap mixed in water and put into a garden sprayer. This stuff works by covering the little breathing holes on buggy bodies and suffocating them. There are no chemicals in Insecticidal Soap, but it can't be sprayed without care since it kills beneficial insects too. 

Finally there are physical barriers like cloth row covers. These keep the pests away from plants in an attempt to give the plant a running start. But row covers are time consuming, light depriving, and expensive to buy, so it's not likely we will invest in them this year. 

Since our problem is mostly beetles, we will rely heavily on the first and second means of keep their numbers down. We will carefully plan our gardens to include elements which deter bugs from sticking around or attract the bad bugs to their death. We will put down Nematodes to try and get them out of the soil. 

Flea Beetles

We have no hope of getting rid of all the bad bugs, but we can encourage the good ones that eat them if we are mindful of the problem.  The bug problem is a large and growing concern as we open more planting spaces and put out much more composted materials and leaf debris. The bug problem is much on our minds right now as we plan on making the Farm a planting success.