PESTS!!!!!

This spring/summer we ran into a lot of pests! We had aphids on our greens, cabbage worms/moths on our broccoli and squash vine borers on all our squash plants so needless to say we had our pest problems. We had a friend in the neighborhood who gave us some home remedies that would get rid of them. So here are the recipes and what they can deter.

Cayenne Pepper/flour mix

It's just that - Cayenne pepper and flour. I put 2 cups of flour in a bowl and mix in Cayenne pepper till mix is pink. I put it in a salt shaker with the holes drilled out and it worked great. Shake on leaves of plants and on steam after watering. Vary effective on aphids. The friend said this will work for pretty much any pest from aphids to rabbits and cats. When you get ready to eat produce make sure you scrub the mix off.

Oil/water/soap mix

mix in a spray bottle

2 tablespoons of cayenne pepper oil (my mother grew cayenne peppers 2 years ago. She put some cayenne peppers in veggie oil and olive oil. You can just put them in veggie oil to save money.)

2 teaspoons of dish soap (hand soap works just not as well as dish soap)

Then fill rest of bottle with water. Shake. Then spray on bugs. Good for the flying bugs like cabbage moths, Japanese beetle and squash bugs.

You can use a bucket of soapy water to knock japanese beetles and other pests into. The soap breaks down the surface tension of the water and allows it to flow into the bugs' breathing holes. And then for those pesky eggs what we have found to work and is slightly gratifying is using a long necked lighter to burn those suckers!

Hope these work for you as well as they do for us!