I am having a serious problem keeping bugs from eating away at my small garden in my backyard. I have tried marigolds to keep them and the bunnies away, but nothing seems to be working. Is there anything I can do that will be organic? I don’t want to put pesticides and such on my plants, it sounds gross.
Comments
Citronella Oil
I think I saw some vials Lowe’s. Or maybe it was Home depot.
Since I don’t like the smell of citronella, I would use a tea made out of tobacco.
What you need to get is a twist of chewing tobacco and grind it up. Put the grindings into a tea bag sort of thing and pour some boiling water over it. The water will start to get dark, but let it sit for a while and stir it occasionally.
Filter the water through a paint filter, which you can buy at lowes or a paint store and then put it into a pump up sprayer and spray it on the plants. Bugs don’t like tobacco and I doubt that rabbits do either. I have never seen a rabbit chewing tobacco.
You will have to put up with some bugs eating some of your plants-this is true even if you use synthetic pesticides (despite the spin put out by the sellers of these toxic products who want us to think plants can’t grow without them and one spray fixes everything. it doesn’t because if that is all it took these companies certainly would not be making the billions in profits they do). A plant can lose up to 70% of its’ foliage and still produce well (okay, leafy greens are an exception to this rule)
things you can do to control pest insects
encourage beneficial insects into your garden to eat the pests. 95%+ of all insects are neutral or beneficial, making under 5% pests. Encourage the good guys into your garden.
Hand pick bugs and destroy them. Gross? I suppose for many this is, but if you are going to grow organically you have to get over being squeamish about touching bugs. But before doing this you have to know who to kill and who to leave so learn about the bugs in your area.
Keep your soil fertility up by feeding the soil with compost and green manures (plants grown specifically to be cut down and turned into the soil)
Row covers used to exclude pests. these work very well but do have to be applied at the time the plants are planted in the ground
I would suggest you learn what you are doing Organic is not about avoiding all pesticides (there are organic pesticides after all) and fertilizers. Rather is is about achieving balance in your ecosystem and feeding the soil. is a site with a lot of information on organic growing I suggest you start there
