How to Use Flowers as Natural Pest Control
Hard work can be erased in a flash when moles and leaf-eating insects make their home in your yard and garden. Take action against these pests and brighten up your yard with flowers as natural pest control. Once the blooms are established, you can sit back and enjoy a colorful and pesticide-free outdoors. Does this Spark an idea?
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Instructions
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Stake out an area of focus in large yards. Aim for trouble parts of your lawn or scatter plants throughout the yard. Since you are planting plants that attract many insects, you may want to avoid areas where most of the guest entertaining or family gathering is done like near decks and pools.
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Create a perimeter for smaller yards. Depending on what kinds of pests are plaguing you, choose to group pest-fighting flowers or surround the lawn with the plants.
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Fight leaf-eating insects with some queen anne's lace. The delicate white flowers attract small insects which gobble up leaf-eating caterpillars.
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Plant any members of the colorful daisy family and bring on the ladybugs. Ladybugs love to munch on mites and aphids which can destroy a garden.
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Buy some black-eyed susans and asters. Hover-flies and lacewings are attracted to these yellow and pink flowers and are hearty aphid eaters.
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Get some Mexican marigold. It repels moles and adds a hint of orange color as well. Marigolds also give off a fragrance which keeps the mosquitoes away.
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Root out grubs with some pretty peonies. Use the full and sweet-smelling peony to attract the predators of these root-eating pests.
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Shoo away white flies with sunflowers. The tall, bright yellow flowers attract pirate bugs which dine on white flies.
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Tips & Warnings
Purchase castor-oil plants to fight moles. Attractive reddish-colored seed heads and large leaves make them look like flowers.
Create an "insectary" by planting groups of pest-fighting flowers. Six or seven varieties of these plants is enough to reduce pest numbers.
Castor-oil plants are poisonous if ingested by pets or children. Take note of the toxicity of a plant or flower before introducing it to a child-friendly yard.
