Leaf Miners Control

Those white curl lines are a trademark of leaf miners. Leaf miners are insect larvae (Liriomyza munda) which hatch from eggs deposited between the upper and lower surface of plant leaves. The hungry larvae munch their way around the leaf, leaving a telltale white trail or tunnel. Tunnels can provide an entry point for fungus or bacteria if the leaves are not removed.

Here are some tips for Controlling the leaf miners:

LEAF MINERS LIFE CYCLE

• Monitor plant leaves closely. At the first sign of tunneling, squeeze the leaf at the tunnel between two fingers to crush any larvae. Done soon enough, this killing larvae can allow plants to survive minor outbreaks.

• Pick off and destroy any affected leaves and leaf miner larvae.

• Grow your veggies organically, without the use of sprays or chemicals that could upset the balance of beneficial predator insects, since leaf miners can be largely controlled by natural predators.

• Keep your plants healthy and well watered, so they can recover from the infestation (and the necessary leaf-plucking).

• Keep your garden clean and free of weeds or debris that can harbor insects and diseases.

• Neem spray in regular interval may control this problem.




Sources: various internet sites and books

How to get rid of Ants

Even though ants play a critical role to the environment, ants can also become pests as well when they invade your garden in large numbers seeking shelter and food. An ant invasion is the last thing you might want in your garden as this can really have some very serious consequences. In most cases, gardeners will reach out for intense chemicals and pesticides to eradicate them. Pest control using chemicals is potentially harmful and it is essential that you think about alternative ways of getting rid of ants from your garden. Ants however do good things to the environment to some extent such as eating the larva of spiders, fleas, fleas, bed bugs, clothes months and silverfish. So, while you are planning to get rid of ants from your garden, it is essential that you consider controlling them rather than complete elimination. For the ants that you need to get rid off from your garden, there are some natural, effective and easy ways of warding them off from your garden. These offer you a more economical, environmentally friendly approach of getting rid of ants and ensuring that your garden stays ant free as described here below:

1. Use Vinegar

Ants use their antennae to perceive smells which helps them determine not only the direction of the scents but also its intensity as well. If forager ants find food in your garden, they will mark a trail which leads them to the colony and many other ants follow the trail to access the food. By making use of white vinegar on the paths that you know are followed by the ants, you will be able to disrupt their scent trains. This makes it quite hard for them to be able to travel back to the source of food they have been invading in your garden. To do so, just mix the vinegar with some water and spray around your garden everywhere you find the ant trails.

2. Use sidewalk chalks

If you are a keen observer, you might have seen that ants do not mix with sidewalk chalk. As such, this gives you a natural solution to keeping the ants at bay from your garden. When ants stumble on the chalk, the white stuff covers them on their body. It is also said that the minerals found in the sidewalk chalk like talc kills the ants and thus offering you an ideal way of eliminating the ants from your garden. However, this option is more effective when it is combined with another method.

3. Ant honey plates/pots

Getting rid of ants from your garden completely might not always be an easy thing as most of the methods you could be using to exterminate them might not just be working. In such a case, a better idea would be try diversion which might probably work to your favor. If the colony seems to have set up a camp at your home, diversion can help minimize their disastrous effects on your garden. By laying a honey plates/pots somewhere else, the ants will know that they have a much better source of food than struggling to get some from your garden. Once you clean up their scent trails and use some deterrent on the entrances, you can be sure that the ants will stay for a long time without creeping back to your garden.

4. Using essential oil entrance blockers

Ants are known to dislike strong smells very much because they greatly mess up their communication and scent trails. As if this is not enough, essential oils cover their bodies when they are crawling through it and you can take advantage of this to get rid of ants from your garden. It is even advisable that you try experimenting with different blends of oils to find out which ones works best in your garden. Focus more on spraying the essential oil on the entrance areas which ants use when finding their way into your garden. Keep repeating as the scent continues to fade and you will be able to keep them at bay from your garden.

5. Ant balls

When it comes to a point where spraying the essential oil solution doesn't seem to work, it is essential that you think about busting the ant balls out. Use of cotton balls as a barrier for keeping away ants from your home can be very effective. However, place the cotton balls in a place in your garden where your pets will not see them as a snack and feast on them.

Items Needed

1/2 cup of sugar

1 1/2 tablespoons Borax(Borax, also known as sodium borate, sodium tetraborate, or disodium tetraborate, is an important boron compound, a mineral, and a salt of boric acid. Powdered borax is white, consisting of soft colorless crystals that dissolve easily in water)

1 1/2 cups warm water

Cotton balls or paper towel

Instructions

1. Mix the Borax and sugar together until well combined.

2. Add the mixture to your warm water and mix constantly until the powder has been completely dissolved.

3. Seal the mixture in a jar or container for future use, and use only what you need in the next steps (and save the rest).  It is important that you clearly label the jar, as it will just look like water.  Do not leave this where children can get to it.  (Because this is such an easy solution to make, however, I only kept what I made until after the ants had been gone for a week or more.)

4. Fill some jar lids, milk caps, or other shallow containers with cotton balls or a wad of paper towel.

5. Add the sugar-Borax solution to the prepared lids making sure to soak the cotton balls (or paper towel).

6. Use boiling water and soap

Sometimes, the only way to keep your garden free of ants is by   killing them. If you realize that there is a big nest of ants at your garden, killing them instantly might be the most ideal way. In this regard, use of hot water is the most effective way to eradicate such ants in a non toxic way.

7. Avoid storing unused red soil

Final tip is not to store unused red soil in your garden area.  Ants like red soil very much to make their homes.

8. Other googled recipes

In  a blender add 4-5 hot peppers along with vinegar and dish soap.  Then strain the ingredients. Now add vegetable oil to the mix and shake well to emulsify it. Add required amount of water and spray on the ants. That's it.  But see that you should not spray on plants.

Please leave your comments which recipe has worked you well to benefit other user.

Source: Various internet sites. books & personal experience

Pests & Control Methods

Now there is growing demand for non-chemical means for controlling diseases, insects, and other pests. Allergic reactions to chemicals, a desire to grow purely organic vegetables, or protection for young children are all reasons to use non-chemical controls for pests. If used correctly, non-chemical pest controls can be very effective in keeping your garden healthy.

VFNT Seeds: The easiest way to avoid disease problems is to choose varieties of vegetables that are resistant to disease. Over the years, many disease-resistant vegetable varieties have been developed. You'll notice that seed packages and catalog descriptions of some vegetable varieties include V, F, N, and T in the name. These abbreviations indicate disease resistance that has been bred into the variety. V and F stand for verticillium and fusarium wilts, which are fungi that cause tomato plants to turn yellow, wilt, and die. N indicates nematode tolerance. Nematodes are tiny parasitic worms that cause knots on stems and roots of vegetables. Tobacco mosaic virus, indicated by a T, affects foliage by yellowing and curling; it also causes severe root damage.

Water Early: If you water your plants with a from overhead, it's best to water early in the day so plants can dry off before night falls. Foliage that stays wet for long periods of time is susceptible to leaf diseases, fungi that grow on leaves, tender stems, and flower buds. This tends to be a problem when plants stay wet throughout the night: Fungi spread quickly during the cool, moist evening hours. The fungi will cause the plant to be weakened, flowers will fall off, and fruit will begin to spot and become soft.

Crop Rotation: Do not grow the same plant family in the same spot year after year. Repetition of the same crop gives diseases a chance to build up strength. Design your plan so that each family of vegetables --cabbage family, cucumber family, and tomato/pepper family -- can be moved to another block of your garden on a three-year rotation.

Paper Collar

You may notice one morning that a couple of healthy young plants have keeled over and died. This is a pretty sure indication that cutworms are present. Feeding at night and hiding during the day, cutworms are most destructive early in the season, cutting off transplants at ground level. To prevent the cutworm from finding your cabbages, peppers, and tomatoes, wrap each stem with a paper or thin cardboard collar as you transplant it into the garden. The collar should reach at least one inch below and one inch above the soil level. In time, the collar will disintegrate; by then the danger of cutworm damage will have passed.

Beer: A Handy Bait

Snails and slugs pose a problem for many garden plants, especially during seasons with plenty of rain and rich, succulent growth. Lettuce and potatoes are especially susceptible to slug damage: Irregular holes will be found in the leaves. Snails and slugs feed mostly at night, hiding from the hot sun.

One way to control these pests is to remove the places where they hide; but if you're using mulch in the garden and supplying plants with the moisture they need, you're still likely to find snails and slugs. Although commercial baits are available, shallow pans of beer placed throughout the garden will attract and drown the pests.

Beneficial Insects

Not all insects in the garden are pests. Most are benign residents, and some are actually beneficial, providing a means to control insect pests. Insects such as ladybugs, lacewing flies, and praying mantises feed on bugs that are destructive to your crops. You should protect them when you find them in your garden. Harmless to your garden plants, these useful insects gorge on aphids, beetles, caterpillars, grasshoppers and other bothersome insects.

Sources : http://home.howstuffworks.com/organic-pest-control-for-a-vegetable-garden.htm

OPERATIONAL MANUAL - DO IT YOURSELF KIT

The Horticulture Department, Tamil Nadu Government issues Do it Yourself Kit to general public along with Operational Manual, which is in Tamil & English. Click here to view Operational Manual

New Terrace Gardeners, who do not want all the items in the Kit issued by the department, can purchase the required items mentioned in the manual from the open market and make the grow bags themself as per their requriement.

Happy Gardening!

Companion Planting

Many plants have natural substances in their roots, flowers, leaves etc. that can alternately repel (anti-feedants) and/or attract insects depending on our needs. In some

situations they can also help to enhance the growth rate and flavour of other varieties. In nutshell, companion planting helps to bring a balanced eco-system to the garden, allowing nature to do its' job. Nature integrates a diversity of plants, insects, animals, and other organisms into every ecosystem so there is no waste. The death of one organism can create food for another, meaning symbiotic relationships all around. By using companion planting, we can discourage harmful pests without losing the beneficial allies. There are many varieties of herbs, flowers, etc. that can be used for companion plants. We should open to experiment and find what works for us. Some possibilities would be using certain plants as a border, backdrop or inter planting in flower or vegetable beds depending on our needs. We have to use plants that are native to our area so that the insects we want to attract already know what to look for! Plants with open cup shaped flowers are the most popular with beneficial insects.

Companion planting can combine beauty and purpose to give you an enjoyable, healthy environment. There are many ways we can find to incorporate these useful plants in our garden, orchard, flower beds etc. 

To know more on Companion Planting click here.

Happy Gardening.

Source : http://www.ghorganics.com/page2.html

         http://twomenandalittlefarm.blogspot.in/2011/05/companion-planting.html

            http://houseandgardendesign.blogspot.in/

Bio-dynamic Agriculture

Do you know Bio-Dynamic Agriculture?

Bio-dynamics, derived from two Greek words, bios life and dynamos energy, refers to the agriculture science that recognizes basic principles at work in nature and applies this knowledge of life forces to bring about balance and healing in the soil.

Bio-dynamic methods produce a living soil with increased biological activity, in alignment with planetary cosmic rhythms, particularly those of the sun, moon and planets in the fixed constellations. Cosmic energies can work strongly through a living soil down into the plant. The coordinated working together of earthly and cosmic energies is what brings about healthy and nutritious plants. Bio-dynamics is a complete holistic outlook on agriculture.

To read more on this subject, please click the following link http://www.biodynamics.in/ of Bio-Dynamic Association of India (BDAI)

Also read the article on  Pest and Disease Control in Vegetable Cultivation by Organic & Bio-dynamic Farming Methods. For the beginners, this article is useful.