Organic farming: biological protection against pests and weeds

Recommendation points

• Useful inhabitants of gardens and vegetable gardens
• Plants that protect our garden
• Using herbal decoctions and infusions
• Wrecking giants

The principles of organic farming are based on a sensible approach to land and plants, due to which it is possible to achieve stable yields without the use of mineral fertilizers and pesticides. The essence of biological farming is to organize the economy like ecosystems in the wild, where each plant and animal has a clearly assigned role. Today we will find out how to protect plants from pests without using means harmful to nature and the human body..

In the previous articles of the cycle: “Organic farming: the main features”, “Stop destroying the earth by digging and weeding” and “Fokin’s flat cutter instead of a cultivator” we said that the main goal of organ gardeners is to take care of soil inhabitants (earthworms, bacteria) , through the efforts of which the humus layer is created and increased and fertility increases. Today we will find out how to protect plants without harming the environment..

The well-known saying “the best defense is an attack” is completely irrelevant for the laws of nature. On the contrary, the more the gardener fights pests, the more they become. And a striking example of this is the war between man and the Colorado potato beetle. With what and no matter how they poisoned him, he gets used to everything and every year he eats leaves of potatoes, tomatoes and eggplants with pleasure. How can this be explained?

Everything is very simple. Every natural organism is designed in such a way that in response to any aggression, self-defense mechanisms are triggered. Insect pests adapt to new conditions – be it spring frosts or another batch of chemicals. There is no doubt that many of them will die. However, there will be a large number of larvae that will be able to survive in such harsh conditions, as a result of which a mutated generation will appear, not afraid of any newfangled poisons..

The way out of this vicious circle is prompted by nature itself. And his name is harmony. In those ecosystems that, fortunately, have not yet been touched by the human “genius”, the processes of self-healing and self-organization are clearly working. Worms and microbes create the soil from which plants receive everything they need for full development. Pests always live on plants, but their number is skillfully restrained by predators living nearby. As a result, all quietly and peacefully coexist with each other and do not bring each other anything but benefit. Let’s try to figure out how to create such a wonderful coexistence in our gardens and summer cottages..

Useful inhabitants of gardens and vegetable gardens

Not every farmer knows “by sight” his little helpers who are able to maintain that valuable ecological balance, which is discussed in our article. Predatory insects (entomophages) can reduce or even completely destroy the number of insect pests (phytophages). Entomophages, if the necessary conditions are created for them, quickly respond to the growth of the phytophagous population and significantly help humans in the struggle. Let’s take a closer look at them.

Ladybugs are a kind of symbol of organic farming. Each adult insect and its larvae eat up to 70 aphids per day. These beetles live and breed in fallen leaves – well mulched soil will become a cozy and reliable home for them..

Riders (small wasps) lay eggs in various harmful caterpillars and aphids, feed on pollen of meadow grasses, hibernate under bark scales and in layers of other organic matter.

Ground beetles hunt slugs, wireworms, young bear and Colorado potato beetle larvae at night. These insects live in burrows under dense bushes or in deciduous litter..

Lacewings are insects that look like large mosquitoes. During its life, this mosquito is able to destroy up to 500 aphids, ticks and scale insects. The lacewing overwinters on compost heaps in non-freezing crevices or under a layer of foliage. To restore the population in spring, it needs pollen and nectar of meadow plants..

It is impossible to overestimate the role of insects in such an important matter as plant pollination. There is such a little bee – osmium. These insects live in small families in woody voids, reproduce very quickly and feed their larvae with pollen. Each individual is capable of flying up to 5,000 flowers per day – this is such a pollinator’s talent..

If you just take beneficial insects somewhere and settle them on the site, then the effect can be short-lived. It is much more important to create the conditions necessary for their life, the main of which is the availability of a food base and places for life and reproduction. It should be remembered that it is flowering plants that attract predatory insects, not pests. The presence of nectar flowers in the garden allows these small predators to feed at different stages of reproduction (the larvae cannot hunt yet).

It should be noted that in order to regulate the number of insect pests, it is necessary to attract predators of various species – one ladybug cannot cope with all of them. To expand the variety of beneficial insects, they should be provided with a rich food base. To do this, on the site you need to sow Compositae umbrella and paniculate plants, which will be a wonderful source of nectar and a place to live..

Such small animals as shrews, lizards, hedgehogs and frogs provide the gardener with an invaluable service, destroying a large number of harmful insects. Particularly useful for the vegetable garden and garden of various kinds of toads and lizards. These animals feed on insect pests. For example, the grass frog prefers slugs and grasshoppers, the green toad prefers bedbugs, and the gray toad prefers ants. The menu of frogs and lizards also includes weevils, wireworms, Colorado potato beetle larvae. Lizards are happy to eat caterpillars and slugs. A distinctive feature of frogs and toads is that they hunt at night and destroy insects that are nocturnal. Moreover, they can feed on pests with a protective coloration and an unpleasant smell, which even birds do not eat..

In order for these assistants to live in your gardens and dachas, it is necessary to create comfortable conditions for them. Lizards like to live in piles of broken branches or among roots somewhere in a quiet corner of the garden, while frogs live in large piles of last year’s foliage..

Plants that protect our garden

An excess of weeds in the garden is harm. No one doubts this. However, their complete absence will not bring anything good. Most weeds are wonderful nectar plants and attract many beneficial insects to your site..

There are many plants in nature that have insecticidal properties. Such plants scare away harmful insects and have a detrimental effect on pathogens of various diseases. For example, weeds such as nettle, euphorbia, field mint, wormwood, chamomile, yarrow, planted in the garden in small quantities, repel most pests, stimulate the growth of cultivated plants, improve the taste and quality of the crop. Harmful insects do not like the smell of basil and coriander, marigolds and calendula and go away from such gardens to “clean” areas.

Some plants that we grow as crops also have insecticidal properties. For example, you can plant onions or garlic in the aisles of strawberries. These plants scare away weevils and strawberry mites, onion phytoncides protect strawberry beds from gray rot.

The smell of dill, parsley, celery can repel many pests. These plants are recommended to be grown in the aisles of cabbage, potatoes, tomatoes to protect against various diseases, such mixed plantings will not please even the Colorado potato beetle.

Some plants planted nearby protect and protect each other. Raspberries growing near the apple tree will protect it from scab, and the apple tree raspberries – from gray rot. In more detail about intensive planting and crop compatibility, we will talk with you in the following articles..

Using herbal decoctions and infusions

The main method of pest and disease control, which is used in organic farming, is the use of various infusions and decoctions of plants with insecticidal properties. Such drugs do not cause absolute death of all pests, but they can significantly reduce their population without harming beneficial animals..

The action of infusions and decoctions is not always based precisely on insecticidal properties, that is, on the ability to kill. In many cases, such herbal preparations mask the smell of plants, and the pest simply cannot find them. For example, if you sprinkle cabbage with infusion of potato tops, and potatoes with infusion of cabbage, then, guided by the smell, cabbage butterflies will lay eggs on the leaves of potatoes. Accordingly, their larvae will be left without food and will die..

Another way of using plant infusions is that the leaves of the culture change their taste and become unattractive to pests. These properties are possessed by infusions of wormwood and needles..

Plant infusions decompose very quickly after treatment of crops, therefore, to obtain the desired effect of spraying, it is necessary to carry out several times with an interval of 7-10 days. The insecticidal properties of various herbal preparations are manifested only in direct contact with pests..

For herbal preparations to be as effective as possible, you need to know the basic rules for collecting raw materials for their preparation. Plants are harvested in the budding and flowering phase – it is at this time that they contain the largest amount of active toxic substances. The collection of raw materials must be carried out in dry, clear weather. The plant material is dried in a shaded, ventilated place, then crushed to prepare various preparations. In order for the infusion to wet the leaves well when spraying, laundry soap diluted in water is added to it at the rate of 40 grams per bucket of solution. Crop processing should be carried out on dry leaves in calm, cool weather.

Bitter pepper infusion is considered a versatile repellent. To prepare it, you need to grind 5-6 pepper pods, pour a liter of water and let it brew for a day, then strain through cheesecloth. This tool can be used to treat plants infected with any diseases or pests..

Garlic has a very wide spectrum of action. It is most convenient to use this plant by preparing a semi-finished product – garlic oil. To do this, grind 10-12 cloves of garlic and mix with a glass of vegetable oil, let it brew for a day. During the preparation of the solution for processing plants, add 2 tablespoons of garlic oil per liter of water, and add a few drops of liquid soap here. Garlic-based treatment allows you to fight slugs and snails, cabbage caterpillars and aphids.

And by mixing pepper and garlic, we get “fire water”. For its preparation, 3 pods of hot pepper are mixed with 3 cloves of garlic (all this in a crushed form), poured with one liter of water and insisted for 2-3 days in the sun, then filtered. An effective broad-spectrum composition is ready.

Organic farming in its arsenal has a large number of such recipes, which are wonderfully described in the book by N. M. Zhirmunskaya “A vegetable garden without chemistry”.

Wrecking giants

With such harmful animals as the bear and the Colorado potato beetle, probably every gardener is familiar firsthand. These insects have very few natural enemies and, unfortunately, one hundred percent ecological ways to combat them have not yet been invented. So what should a farmer who is interested in an ecologically clean harvest and preservation of natural harmony do? First of all, you need to study the enemy’s habits and lifestyle well in order to prevent him from feeling comfortable in your garden..

Medvedka loves bare and dug ground – so her nest warms up better. Observations show that this pest does not live under a thick layer of mulch in moist soil..

At the beginning of summer, the bear arranges a nest in the ground at a depth of 10–15 cm, the location of which can be easily identified by gnawing adult plants 30–40 cm south of the nest (so as not to shade). Having determined where the pest’s nest is, you can simply dig it up and destroy it..

Medvedki are great for honey. Jars or bottles with a wide neck should be greased with honey from the inside and dug in almost flush with the soil, and covered with a bent piece of iron or cardboard on top. These pests will crawl onto such a bait in large quantities, both large and small. Once every one and a half to two weeks, you need to clean the containers and lubricate them again, so during the season you can overfill the entire population of these pests.

The most effective method for the destruction of bears is that two times a summer it is necessary to dig up manure heaps and eliminate insects by hand. It is also useful to dig up manure in winter, in severe frosts, almost all pests freeze out. And yet, it would be nice to have a cat on the site, these pets perceive the bear as prey and hunt them with pleasure.

The situation with the Colorado potato beetle is much worse. You cannot count the amount of various pesticides that this unkillable insect managed to survive. First of all, beneficial soil and terrestrial inhabitants suffer from these drugs, but the beetle does not care. Poisons from drugs get into the soil, from the soil into plants, from plants into our body.

The Colorado potato beetle can spend several years in a row in the ground, and in a productive year it can get out to the surface. One female of this pest is capable of laying up to 1000 eggs, the larvae and the beetles themselves are poisonous for most insects, and we kill those that are capable of destroying them with poisons. So it turns out that the most effective way to fight is to walk on potatoes with a bucket and a broom every day and pick the beetle by hand. But you still need to find time and energy for this..

However, all is not lost. The Colorado potato beetle can greatly ruin the appetite by spraying potatoes with celandine infusion: a bucket of herbs is poured with boiling water, cooled and sprayed with plantings once a week. It is also good to use for these purposes the infusion of hot pepper and “fire water”, which were discussed above.

If you plant cilantro, marigolds, beans or beans in the aisles of potatoes, the beetle can be confused by odors that are unusual for itself. It is not bad for the same purpose to sow mustard next to the potato beds – and we will grow the green manure and drive the beetle away.

Practicing gardeners from year to year improve the methods and methods of ecological pest control, but the main and main one remains one – it is the maintenance of natural balance and the creation of optimal conditions for the life of useful creatures. What you need to do for this:

1. Stimulate the life of animals and insects in your backyards and summer cottages.
2. Strive to create a diverse sustainable ecosystem both on the site as a whole and in individual beds.
3. Benefit from the insecticidal properties and healing effects of various plants.
4. Study the habits and lifestyle of pests, this will help to catch them with bait, scare them away and prevent them from multiplying.

Every self-respecting gardener should strive for this. It will become easier for everyone if the process of struggle is replaced by a process of reasonable coexistence, in which there will be no need to use dangerous pesticides that adversely affect our health and the environment..