How To Deal With Cruciferous Pests

2024 Author: Sebastian Paterson | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:47

Cruciferous pests: fleas, flies, slugs

The most common crops in the garden are cruciferous - cabbage, turnip, radish, radish, rutabaga, horseradish.

They are affected by more than 20 types of pests. And each of them hurts in its own way. The seedlings of radish or cabbage seedlings are attacked by small dark bugs with a metallic sheen - cruciferous fleas.

They overwintered in the upper soil layer and appeared in early spring. There is still nothing on the beds, and at this time the fleas feed on the leaves of cruciferous weeds, for example, the leaves of a shepherd's purse, which hibernates with leaves. Rape, wild radish and other weeds soon appear.

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Then fleas move to cruciferous vegetables. They eat holes on them. This can dry out the leaves. The worst thing is that if fleas damage the growth point, this can lead to the death of the plant. These beetles lay their eggs in the soil. Their larvae feed on small roots and are harmless. By the middle of summer, the larvae pupate and young beetles appear, which again damage the plants. In the fall, they go to winter.

Start the fight against flea beetles in the fall, carefully removing weeds and digging up the soil

In the spring - when shoots appear - water and feed the plants to speed up their growth. To combat the pest, there are several ways: place between the rows of paper flags greased with special caterpillar glue (used to set trapping rings on trees against harmful insects and caterpillars crawling onto trees from the ground. Here is one of the recipes for its preparation: 3 parts of petroleum jelly, 4 parts of var, 20 parts of pine resin, 2.5 parts of rosin.

Var, pine resin and crushed rosin are gradually added to the petroleum jelly melted over the fire, the mixture is kept on fire until a uniform ointment is obtained), or pull the flytrap adhesive tapes. Jumping fleas stick to the trap. To repel the pest, you can spray the plantings with tobacco dust. Treat cabbage seedlings with a pesticide solution.

The pest of cabbage plants is a horseradish leaf beetle, or, as it is also called, babanukha. Dark blue shiny beetles and their dirty yellow larvae eat through holes in the leaves of cruciferous plants. Horseradish is especially badly damaged. In the second half of summer, only veins remain from its leaves, although the plant itself suffers little, even with severe damage. Cabbage and radish babanukha are also damaged very seriously. Several generations of these beetles develop over the summer. The fight consists of treating cabbage with pesticide solutions and killing weeds.

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Cabbage flies

Cabbage flies are the most dangerous pests of cabbage. They become active with the beginning of flowering of lilac and colza. After feeding on flowers, the flies lay their eggs on the base of the seedling stalk or on the lumps of soil next to it. After a while, larvae appear, which damage the root system, making moves in it. The root rots, and the plant turns purple. The fly gives two generations per year. The second generation appears when the plants are already sufficiently developed, so their harm is hardly noticeable. It is difficult to fight the larvae.

Therefore, scare off flies when they lay eggs. Sprinkle tobacco dust at the base of the stem. Plant celery next to the cabbage, the smell of which is not like flies. Water and feed constantly to increase the plant's endurance. Huddle the cabbage to induce the formation of additional roots. When harvesting, do not leave stumps in the ground. Dig up the soil. Cabbage flies cause the worminess of radishes and turnips. Use celery and tobacco dust to scare off these flies during lay.

White butterflies are found in three species. They vary in size, track color, and damage.

Cabbage butterfly

The largest butterfly, the cabbage, has a wingspan of 6 cm. The butterflies emerge from overwintered pupae at the end of May or in June. After feeding and mating, females lay yellow elongated eggs in heaps of 15-100 pieces on the underside of cabbage leaves.

Caterpillars, yellowish with black spots, emerge from them, which devour the leaves, leaving only the largest veins. Then caterpillars pupate, and young butterflies emerge by the end of July - beginning of August. They also leave offspring, and their pupae hibernate.

To prevent colonization of plants by caterpillars, regularly inspect plants, destroy eggs and larvae. Caterpillars are poisonous, so work with gloves. Butterflies of the whitethroat and the rutabeda are smaller, reaching 4 cm in the wingspan. They fly out earlier than the cabbage - in April - May and lay eggs also on the underside of the leaves, but one at a time. Their caterpillars are green, velvety, and it is very difficult to notice them on the leaves. They are usually given away by damage caused by large irregular holes in the leaves. The second generation also damages the inner leaves of the heads of cabbage. On radishes, turnips and radishes, the harm is most often small, in extreme cases, you can collect the caterpillars by hand. But systematically inspect cabbage and, if necessary, treat with pesticides.

Slugs

Slugs are terrestrial molluscs that damage almost all vegetable crops. They use a grater tongue to gnaw large holes on the leaves, and eat young plants whole. In some species, adult or young slugs overwinter, while in others - eggs laid in the soil. Their damage is easily distinguished from others by the shiny traces of mucus that remain on the leaves and on the soil. Since slugs are afraid of drying out, they harm them in the dark. During the day, they hide under leaves, boards, in the soil or in any other shade.

Here is my method. To fight slugs, lay out artificial shelters on the site: trim boards, burdock leaves, slate, matting, etc. For a day, mollusks hide there. During the day, collect pests in a jar of kerosene or strong salt solution. The shells of watermelon, vegetable marrow, peeling cucumbers serve as bait for mollusks, which are laid between the plants. Slugs gather on them in the late evening. You can sprinkle strips of slaked lime between the plants or dust the soil surface with it. Use metaldehyde from chemicals. The natural enemies of slugs are beetles - ground beetles, frogs and toads, whose neighborhood is always useful.