Natural Additions Protect and Feed Plants

Keeping gardens pest-free is sometimes as easy as reaching into the refrigerator.

William Cureton, an organic gardener from Trussville, Ala., who lectures on the topic and goes by the nickname "Captain Compost," says that simple kitchen products can be used to alleviate the problems of garden pests and promote a healthy, eco-friendly garden.

"Basically, you're taking a salad dressing and killing a bug with it," he said. "The vegetable oils clog up the thorax of soft-bodied insects. Natural foods to us that we eat will hurt a lot of pests."

Experts like Cureton say that gardening in an eco-friendly manner can be beneficial not only to the garden but also to the gardener. Environmentally friendly gardening can be easy in method and easy on the pocketbook.

Cureton recommends starting from scratch when it comes to creating a healthy garden. He says the most fundamental part of any garden, the placement of plants, can contribute to a thriving, pest-free garden environment. He recommends gardens not be planted in rows but rather in clusters, as plants would grow in nature.

"Instead of growing rows, you've got to grow plants," he says. "Nature doesn't grow in rows."

This process is called bio-intensive planting, and it leads to a more lush, full garden. Such positionings as planting basil next to tomatoes can chase away certain harmful bugs through the scent of the herb, and planting beans with corn leads to a greater rate of nitrogen in the garden's soil.

Jerry Spencer, an organic grower at Mt. Laurel Organic Gardens in Birmingham, Ala., says this practice of improving the quality of the soil be one of the biggest factors in a well-maintained garden.

"The soil is actually alive," he said. "It's alive with microbes and chemicals, and you start killing the microbes once you start using chemicals as fertilizers or pesticides."

He says the use of chemicals to kill pests leads to the use of more chemicals to revitalize the area, which starts an endless cycle of removing and replenishing microbes, both good and bad.

Both Spencer and Cureton recommend nourishing the soil with a compost tea or a manure tea, a natural fertilizer and revitalizer that is relatively simple to make. All it takes is a shovelful of animal manure (which can be obtained fresh or in packages at hardware stores), a burlap bag or pillowcase, a 5-gallon bucket and some compost (leaves, twigs, sawdust, grass clippings and the like). Simply mix the ingredients in the "tea bag" and let it steep in the bucket of water for a few days. The result is a completely natural fertilizer that allows a garden to maintain a healthy balance between good and bad microbes.

But sometimes even the most well-fertilized and best-kept gardens still face pests that can cause tremendous damage to plants. That's when many gardeners get frustrated and turn to chemical pesticides. A drawback to these, however, is that they don't discriminate in what they kill -- beneficial bugs and microbes get eliminated alongside bad pests and microbes.

"Basically, the theory is this: You don't go out shooting at something with a machine gun when you can kill it with a BB gun," Cureton said of chemical pesticides. He advocates using natural items to control pests instead of opting for chemicals.

For instance, neme oil, an oil made from the Indian neme tree, and canola oil can harm insects, as can diatomaceous earth, a white, dust-like substance that pokes microscopic holes in pests as they crawl through the dirt, altering their appetites and their reproductive capabilities, causing them to die.

Even garlic can serve as a deterrent to keep bugs from entering a garden. Just grind a clove or two of garlic and let it sit outside in a bucket of water for a couple of days, and the result is a garlic water that can be misted on plants to harmlessly deter bugs.

But chemicals can be used as a last resort, says Sallie Lee, agent assistant at the Jefferson County office of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System.

She says gardeners should first identify the insects and make sure they are not, in fact, beneficial insects in their larval stage. "Ladybugs are one of the best helps in the garden -- they eat aphids and do other good things -- but their larvae look awful. They're absolutely hideous," she said.

Second, a gardener should isolate the time to spray when the least damage would be done to the beneficial insects, such as when ladybugs are not at the larval stage.

Third, gardeners should always follow the instructions on the label of a pesticide to the letter in order for them to cause the least amount of damage.

"If you're tempted to double the dose, don't," she said. "It's a waste of money, it's bad for the environment and insects, like humans, can build up an immunity to a substance the more they're exposed to it. We've actually misused some products to the point that insects just kick dirt on them and laugh."

(Contact Katherine Veach of the Birmingham Post-Herald in Alabama at www.postherald.com.)