Safe Alternatives for Weed Control, Pesticides / Insecticides
Preventing & Repelling:
Sanitation:
Clean up food spills immediately. Try to keep hard-to-reach areas reasonably clean and remove clutter that allows pests to hide.
Store foods attractive to pests, such as flour, in the refrigerator.
Water attracts pests, so leaky faucets and pipes should be promptly repaired. Doors and windows should be well screened.
Clothes should be regularly cleaned and aired, and properly stored in paper or cardboard boxes sealed against moths.
A number of nontoxic substances can be used to repel insects.Herbal Repellants:
Essential Oils: The following herbal mix is safe to be used on plants, pets and people and will repel ants, aphids, bean beetles, black flies, cabbage root flies, cabbage white flies, carrot flies, caterpillars, cutworms, flea beetles, fleas, flies, greenflies, lice, mosquitoes, moths, nematodes, plant lice, rodents, ticks and whiteflies;
- 2 cups water
- 4 drops lavender, lemongrass, peppermint, rosemary and sage essential oils
- Combine ingredients in spray bottle; shake well before use.
Basil is a natural insect repellent. Keep a pot in your kitchen. Take a few leaves along with you on a picnic and put them out on the table to keep the flies away.
Bay leaves in your pantry will keep pests away. A bay leaf in a container of flour, cornmeal, or cereal will keep weevils out.
Sprinkle black pepper on home surfaces to prevent pest access by ants, beetles, silverfish, roaches, and moths.
Powdered red chilli pepper, peppermint, bay leaves, cloves, citrus oil, lavender, rosemary, tobacco, peppercorns, eucalyptus, wormwood, and cedar oil can repel various types of insects.
To learn more, or to order, please follow the below link (banner):
Gardening to Fight Insects: Often used in agriculture but can sometimes be used in home and garden situations as well. For instance, planting certain plants in your garden can deter certain pests.
- For example, spearmint / pepper mint repels both ants and mice.
- Garlic repels Japanese Beetles.
- Spiders eat fruit flies and houseflies, so it may be worth leaving some of those webs around.
- Basil is a natural insect repellent. Keep a pot in your kitchen. Take a few leaves along with you on a picnic and put them out on the table to keep the flies away.
Getting Rid of Insects & Weeds - Safely
Weeds:
Hot water will kill most unwanted plants --just boil some water and pour it over the plant you want to kill.
Please also refer to "Organic Lawn Care" for tips and tricks.
Insects can be trapped and killed without resorting to dangerous chemicals:
Generally a poison nontoxic to humans is mixed with a food that insects find attractive, and spread in the infested area. Examples are oatmeal (attractive) and plaster-of-Paris (poisonous), and cocoa powder and flour (attractive) and borax (poisonous). Old-fashioned flypaper -- not a hanging strip of insecticide -- is an effective trap.
Many zoos are keeping chicken to control the insect population.
Insecticide Spray:
Mix 8 ounces black strap molasses or white sugar, and 8 ounces 3% hydrogen peroxide in 1 gallon of water..
To get rid of garden pests or insects on house plants:
Make a mixture of 1 tablespoon liquid dishwashing soap and 1 cup of cooking oil. Mix about 3 tablespoons of this concentrate with a quart of water in a pump bottle and spray on plants. Another recipe for insect control: soak citrus rind (lemon, orange, grapefruit) in water for a few days. Pour the water into a pump bottle and spray on plants.
House and garden plants:
Put 1 oz 3% hydrogen peroxide in 1 quart of water. Water or mist plants with this solution.
For specific house pests, try these solutions:
- Ants:
- Sprinkle powdered red chili pepper, paprika, dried peppermint, or borax where the ants are entering. Also cinnamon sprinkled around your foundation is said to keep ants out. Cucumber peel on a kitchen shelf will deter ants. You can also try washing or spraying your cabinets with vinegar and water.
- To get rid of red / fire ants in the garden sprinkle instant grit (a couple of spoon full) over the ant hill The worker ants will take the grit down to the queen who will ingest it. The grit swells inside the queen causing her to explode. I tried it and it works. The first week, I noticed that the ant mounts were fewer and some moved to a new location. I applied it again, and the third week there was no ant mount in the entire garden.
- To keep ants off cages and bird food wrap a strip of double sticky back tape around the bottom of the cage legs.
- Dawn soap: 1 cup to 4 to 5 cups of water. Bill suggests using a leave blower pointed at the mist from a Chapin® garden pump sprayer. He blows the mist on everything and found that the mist suffocates ants, termites, spiders from testing it on them. For tiny mite / insect infestations in the house, he blows the mist under fridge, crawl spaces, ceilings, and in the car. It works well and is cheap. Bill suggested wet vacuuming them up after a few hours.
- Fruit Flies:
- Christ offers the following advice: "What worked for me was a small zip lock baggie, some fruit cut up in it (bananas and watermellon), then I left it open on the kitchen counter overnight, with a light on low in the kitchen, and the next morning there was 10 eating the fruit...so I zipped up the bag and took them outside... I had to repeat this for 3-4 days, but then they were all gone. Also, make sure your "garbage disposal" in your sink is clean and ran often...they like to nest in it! Bleach down it can help. There's other ways to get them, but this worked well for me. "
- Have a wonderful day!
Chris (and Cody-bird...the King!)
- Fill ziplock back half full with vinegar and set them around the area you see fruit flies. Make sure that the bags are wide open. The flies will be attracted to the smell and get into the bags. Zip up the bag and throw away.
- Debra suggests the following: "When I am over run with Fruit Flies I wait till night time and turn off every light in the area that is infested and open a door or window near an outside light, those little buggers fly right out side to get to that light! After about 3 days, no more Fruit flies. Try it, it works
- Marcia suggests "dish detergent and water and a little fruit juice. "
- Melissa: "I have found that leaving a glass soda bottle with the last sip of soda left in it will catch a lot of them. Cream soda works really well for this. Also, you can put some wine on a glass, put a paper towel over the top held in place with a rubber band, and punch a few small holes in it. They will get in, but not back out."
- Mary suggests: "[P]ut a little apple cider vinegar in a bowl with a couple drops of dish liquid soap. Place it away from the cage and the little flies will be attracted to it. "
- Christ offers the following advice: "What worked for me was a small zip lock baggie, some fruit cut up in it (bananas and watermellon), then I left it open on the kitchen counter overnight, with a light on low in the kitchen, and the next morning there was 10 eating the fruit...so I zipped up the bag and took them outside... I had to repeat this for 3-4 days, but then they were all gone. Also, make sure your "garbage disposal" in your sink is clean and ran often...they like to nest in it! Bleach down it can help. There's other ways to get them, but this worked well for me. "
- Beetles: Kill manually when you see them.
- Cockroaches
- Flea Control
- For moths: Air clothes well in the sun; store in airtight containers, and scatter sachets of lavender, cedar chips, or dried tobacco in with clothing. . Mint teabags can be used in your clothing drawers or in your closet to repel moths.
- For rats and mice: Holes in exterior or interior walls should be closed off and storage spaces kept orderly. Garbage should be kept tightly covered. POISONS ARE NOT RECOMMENDED for rat control, because children or other animals may eat it by mistake. Also, poisoned rats can die in hard to reach places causing a very bad smell.To catch rodents, the most efficient system is the oldest: a cat. Next best are mouse and rat traps.
The best trap is the large, simple, cheap wooden "snap trap." They are sold in hardware stores.
To use the trap:
- BAIT IT with pieces of apple, potato, raw bacon or with peanut butter spread on a cotton ball.
- ATTACH IT firmly to the ground or solid place to keep the rat from dragging the trap away.
- PLACE THE TRAP near where you have found the droppings. Make sure the trap is safe from people, children, pets or animals who could get hurt from it.
- For termites: Any wooden parts of the house should be at least 18 inches off the ground, as subterranean termites cannot tolerate being exposed to air and light. They have to build easily visible mud tunnels to get at available wood. However, most existing houses have only about an 8-inch clearance between wooden parts and the ground, which makes the wood vulnerable. Metal shields may help discourage termites, but they cannot prevent infestations.\
- Dawn soap: 1 cup to 4 to 5 cups of water. Bill suggests using a leave blower pointed at the mist from a Chapin® garden pump sprayer. He blows the mist on everything and found that the mist suffocates ants, termites, spiders from testing it on them. For tiny mite / insect infestations in the house, he blows the mist under fridge, crawl spaces, ceilings, and in the car. It works well and is cheap. Bill suggested wet vacuuming them up after a few hours.
- For gardens: In hardware stores, look for new brands of safer insecticides that use soap-and water solution to get rid of aphids, or pyrethrum for a number of applications.
- To mix a solution up yourself, mix 1cup of dawn soap to 4 to 5 cups of water. Bill suggests using a leave blower pointed at the mist from a Chapin® garden pump sprayer. He blows the mist on everything and found that the mist suffocates ants, termites, spiders and other insects.
- Several naturally derived pesticides exist which, in some cases, are less toxic to humans than the organophosphates, carbamates or organochlorines now widely used.
- Pyrethrum is relatively nontoxic to humans and only slightly toxic to aquatic life, so it may be the best choice for home gardens.
- Sabadilla controls lice, leafhoppers, squash bugs, striped cucumber beetles, and chinch bugs. It has low toxicity to wildlife, but it may be toxic to bees.
- For lawns: There are no really safe herbicides. The only safe alternative to herbicides is to pull weeds by hand.
However, there are ways to discourage weeds. Please refer to "Organic Lawn Care" for tips and tricks to keep your lawn healthy the organic, non-toxic way..
If you would like to add to or correct any of the above information, or would like to share with web visitors your own experiences, please e-mail the webmaster.
Photo contributions are welcome!
