Natural Methods Of Killing Insect Pests

There are occasions when it just seems that there are much more insects than ever before. Maybe it is the warmer winters and wetter summers helping them breed more easily, or maybe it is because not so many people are using pesticides in their gardens.

It is quite understandable that a great deal of people do not want to use chemicals on their gardens, but not using anything at all results in a growth in the insect population.

During the last fifty or so years, people have become more and more accustomed to using chemical pesticides to poison household and backyard insect pests because they are a quicker and certain killer. So what can you do if you would like to manage the quantity of backyard insect pests, but do not want to use chemicals?

Well, you would have to go back to using natural insect pest killers, although most households have forgotten what their great-grandparents used to use to eradicate insects.

The following is a list of a few of the natural ways of killing insect pests. However, not all methods or plants will be available in all countries.

Stinging nettles: if you cut down a clump of stinging nettles and immerse them in water for a week or more, chemicals will leach out of the nettles into the water. Strain the water off and spray it on your plants. It will kill or discourage a great deal of garden insects. You could also use it as a plant food, but you will have to be careful how concentrated it is.

Rotenone: is a natural insecticidal. It is manufactured from the roots of the derris plant. It kills by attacking the stomachs of insects. However, it is rather slow-acting and has to be reapplied often in order to obtain the maximum impact.

Washing Up Water: soapy water of any sort will kill aphids amongst other garden insect pests. This is a very simple control to administer. Simply strain your soapy water into a spray gun (like an empty window spray gun) and blast your aphids.

Corn flour: you can sprinkle this at the base of plants or skirting boards to kill insects. If a tomato hornworm or a cockroach eats some, the corn flour will swell up in the insect's stomach with the bodily fluids in there and the insect will eventually pop.

Pyrethrum: will paralyze an insect, but it will also wear off, so it is often mixed with a poison to kill the insect off. Otherwise, you can sweep them up.

A combination of cow's milk, flour and water may be used as a natural insecticide, funnily enough. It is very good at killing the eggs of insects. It also destroys insects themselves by blocking their breathing holes. In other words, they asphyxiate.

Neem is a very common tree in India and has medicinal properties too as insecticidal applications. This natural insecticide repels insects by means of an active constituent that mimics an insect hormone. It makes it difficult, if not impossible, to digest food and it blocks their cycle of reproduction. It works best of all on insects that primarily eat leaves.