Having a garden requires a lot of your free time and gentleness of your hands. Sometimes, however, no matter how much you try, something bad is still happening to your plants.
Pests and insects can be both good friends or the worst enemies of the green miracles living in your garden. There is nothing more frustrating than having your basil ruined by pests one day before you were planning to cook a basil sauce.
Some of the bugs ruining your garden may be bugging you, but not all of them are bad for the garden. So, what kind of natural pest control can make you stop frustrating yourself, but also not harm the garden with chemical pesticides?
Many people are now turning to the natural way of treating harmful bugs, because they don’t want to also destroy the food they are going to eat with chemicals. It also won’t be organic and healthy, which is the sole purpose of having your own garden.
Luckily for you, there are a lot of natural ways to protect your healthy food, but don’t forget that only because it is a natural pest control, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it’s not going to be somewhat harmful.
Do you really need this natural pest control spray?
Most of the time, there is no need to panic. You may just need to pay a little more attention to your garden. There are various watering techniques you can try in order to solve the problem.
If your area is small, you might just need to pick the beetles or caterpillars off the vegetables with hands if necessary. Also, the problem you think you have might actually not be a problem at all.
Sometimes aphids, beetles, or slugs only damage a few leaves and that’s all the harm they do, so you don’t have a reason to panic yet. And as we mentioned in the beginning, some insects may as well help your garden shine like never before, so you need to be careful not to kill them.
The benefits of a natural spray
If you are in a desperate need of a natural spray, we will help you, but remember that you might kill the good insects by using the spray, so use it wisely and precautiously! You might be in a need of a spray if you notice a big damage of the plants. In this case, you will use home-made sprays.
Firstly, they are inexpensive, and they have shown good results. Usually, they contain noxious (but non-toxic) ingredients including garlic, stinging nettles, horsetail, or cayenne, which can be mixed with water and blended to be turned into sprays.
You can use are this two most famous, helpful and natural pest control sprays: garlic oil spray and hot pepper spray. They are both effective in treating bad bugs in your garden.
Natural Pest Control Application
Logically, you will apply the spray when the insects are most likely to come. That time is either early morning or early evening. All you have to do is take a bottle that you can spray with and put the spray inside.
The way of spraying is also important. The leaves have to be completely covered with the mixture – both the upper and the underside. Don’t spray leaves that are not infected, because you are only doing harm to them. Be careful and wear clothes that protect you while spraying in the garden.
This process needs to be repeated at least twice a week or every 5th day in order for your plants to be well-protected. You need to repeat the spraying procedure after it rains as well.
And last, but not least, be very careful with the hot pepper sauce, as you might burn yourself.
Garlic oil spray
For this spray except for garlic and olive oil you will need dish soap and water. The procedure is the following: mince 2 cloves of garlic, add one tablespoon olive oil and put that into one gallon of water.
It might look like there are few ingredients to you, but it is actually quite effective, as you will see in the future. The mixture should sit for 24 hours at least, but you can also let it sit for 48 hours, which will give better results.
Next, you need to strain out the garlic and this is the time to add dish soap which is biodegradable into the gallon. You only need a few drops of the soap. Your spray is now ready to use!
For best results, don’t spray in your garden during the hot sun because the oil can cause damage to the leaves – it can burn them when you first apply it. Thus, start using it in the evening.
Hot pepper spray
The other recipe we will share with you has been used more commonly than the previous one. For this spray, you also need one gallon of water ant hot pepper flakes or 10 chopped fresh peppers.
You can use from cayenne to jalapenos, Habanero’s and other types of peppers. You need to put the ingredients in a pan and simmer them for 10-15 minutes. This process is good for infusing the peppers’ oils into the water.
After that, let the mixture sit for approximately 24 hours, and after straining add a few drops of a similar dish soap that is biodegradable. The spray is ready to use now!
Good luck with your garden and keep it safe!
