Story: A Natural Way to Control Pests and Insects
Episode: 6
Presenter: Sue McDougall
Air Date: 25 September 2021

Spring brings lots of new life and also lots of pests. Sue shows us how to naturally protect your garden from pests and insects.

• Large green leaves are a favourite for many insects to feast on.
• Place halves of juiced lemons upside down on the soil and leave overnight. This will reveal in the morning what bugs and insects are around.
• Often tattered leaves on young seedlings are the work of slaters feeding overnight.
• A slater’s role in a garden is to break down dead and decaying matter, the problem is that young seedlings are often tastier, once seedlings are a little more established, they aren’t as susceptible to slater damage.
• If you don’t know what is causing the damage, one of the easiest ways of identification is to take a piece of blank paper and flick the foliage onto the paper, if it's small insects this will make it very easy to see.
• On edible crops it’s so important to control soft-bodied insects with a safe product, you may be familiar with the pyrethrum plant which is a fantastic garden addition.
• The extract of this plant goes into Earthcare natural insect pyrethrum spray and controls whitefly, thrips, ants, earwigs, leafhoppers, flies, aphids, cabbage moths and caterpillars.
• Earthcare is 100% natural, has low toxicity and a withholding period of only one day, which means what you spray today can be eaten tomorrow. It can also be used on many different crops and plants.
• The Diamondback moth is a very destructive pest, it gets its name because when it lands the marks on the wings form the shape of a diamond. The larvae are bright green and small. A few applications of Seasol’s EarthCare Natural Pyrethrum insect spray will keep them protected.

For more information, head to:
www.seasol.com.au