The aforementioned lure of earwigs is the best method of introducing beneficial insects into your garden.For this purpose, in autumn, you should hang pots upside down on tree branches.We put dried grass, tow or other similar material inside. Here, earwigs, colloquially known as pincers, will winter here, and they also have insect pests in their food.
When sowing ornamental plants, remember to plan the seeding of as many abundant flowering species as possible. Thanks to this, we will lure hoverflies into our garden, which are similar to wasps but do not sting.Adult flies eat nectar and honeydew, while the larvae are predatory - they eat, among others, aphids and other pests.The same is true for the larvae of different species of ladybugs that feed on aphids. Adult ladybugs can also feed on the larvae of pests.
In crops under cover, you can use ready-made preparations containing living organisms, e.g. greenhouse phytosei, which is the natural enemy of spider mites. Another preparation that works on a similar principle is the specifics containing the greenhouse fan and the whitefly.Both of these useful insects lay their eggs in the larval stages of a very dangerous pest - the greenhouse whitefly.
The larvae biting out of the eggs parasitize the whitefly larvae, thus reducing its population.In addition to using insects for biological pest control, other beneficial organisms can also be used.The bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis is part of several biological preparations that are used in professional horticulture.
Such preparations include, for example, Dipel WG, which is used to control butterfly larvae in some vegetable crops, or Novodor S.C. against the Colorado potato beetle. The bacterium changes the metabolism of the larva, so that the caterpillar, unable to feed itself, dies of hunger.There are also registered preparations limiting the occurrence of diseases.A great example of this is Polyversum WP, containing spores of the fungus organism Pythium oligandrum.
Polyversum WP is applied to the soil and is used to reduce the occurrence of diseases such as seedling rot, gray mold, fusariosis and phytophthora on rhododendrons and conifers. Contans, on the other hand, works great in reducing hardwood rot.
As you can see, the biological method has a lot of solutions to offer.Unfortunately, the above-mentioned preparations are available only on request, which prevents them from being purchased by gardeners and hobbyists.Therefore, they are used almost exclusively in professional cultivation.
