Important Tools To Keep in Your Gardening Stash To Protect Your Plants
For a gardener, summer brings both good and bad news. The good news is that the garden blooms with an unforeseen abundance of flowers, fresh vegetables and juicy fruits to harvest. Bad news? Pests! They’re the most unwelcome guests in the history of gardening with a unanimous hatred amongst all hobbyists, yet they never fail to show up every single year.
From snails, aphids, slugs and caterpillars, the scorching summers bring all these problems with them. Learning to protect your precious plants, flowers and fresh vegetation from these live threats is just as important as basic knowledge of their needs like fertilization, watering, soil and sun. In this article, we’re sharing five tools that are your best reinforcements in the war against pests. Let’s have a look!
FENCE
What’s the first thing that comes to mind when you think about keeping intruders out of your property? Fencing, right? Well, it’s the same with pests. Even a two or three feet tall board is effective enough to keep the rabbits away, though if your garden looks especially enticing to them, they might be just enough motivated to burrow their way in from down under. That’s why you should dig the fence into the ground by at least a foot.
Use rabbit fencing, hardware cloth or chicken wire to keep small mammals and other unwanted guests out. If you’ve got issues like deers to cater to, you’ll need a fence that’s about six feet tall to make sure nothing can hop in and feast away! For extra protection, place some bird netting over fruit plants like berries to keep them safe as they ripen up.
ELEVATED BEDS
A clever way to keep animals, and pests, from nibbling away at your hard-earned produce is to keep the treasure in elevated beds with no way for insects to reach it. It also keeps your stuff safe from any rabbit damage, especially if you also fence it up on top. You can plant the greens in those window boxes where they’re completely out of reach for deer and bunnies, while plant pots can comfortably fit the railings.
USE BARRIERS
Often, the simpler the solution, the better it works, and that’s the case with barriers. All you need is a fine, insect net to keep those critters away from nibbling down and ruining your fruits and veggies. Just place it right above your plant friends, and cover them up. Make sure there’s sufficient growing room for your plants for the next couple of weeks or so, and you’re set!
You can also press cardboard collard around the plant’s stem and get it an inch-deep into the ground to keep it out of bounds for cult works, and all other sorts of burrowing insects.
REPELLANTS
Repellants are a powerful tool in your pest control arsenal and offer the easiest solution for the preservation of your vulnerable plants, flowers, fruits and vegetables. Just get an odor-repellent spray and go to town on your favorite growers in the garden. Then, any animal that puts its mouth on them and ingests the repellant will feel sick. Note that they won’t die or suffer from any long-term damage, but they’ll be trained to stay away from your garden and the temptations inside it!