How to Keep Gnats Off Your Houseplants 4 Easy Ways

Enjoy the beauty of your plants, keep gnats off of them.

So you've finally gotten your inside plants to grow. You've made sure it has plenty of water and sunlight. Then when looking at it one morning you notice a black dot, when you look closer it is a gnat. At first it is only one, so that is okay but then a few days later you see several more. Now it has become a problem. What's going on? How do you get rid of them?

Things You'll Need

• Spray Bottle
• Dish Soap
• Potatoes
• Liquid Sevin
• New Soil

Instructions

1. Always start with the simple steps. An easy way to rid your indoor and outdoor plants of gnats is to mix water and a very small amount of dish soap in a spray bottle. Spray this mixture on your plants.

2. If you determine that you have fungus gnats, these typically lay eggs in the soil of your plants and only getting rid of the mature gnats will not stop the other ones from appearing. A great way to get rid of the eggs naturally is by slicing up potatoes and placing them in the soil around the plants. These gnats will lay the eggs on the potato slices instead.

3. Keep the potato slices in the soil from 1-3 days then throw them away, to get rid of the eggs throw the slices away. Repeat this until you notice that there are no more gnats around your plants.

4. If you want to use chemicals to kill the eggs in the soil, place Liquid Sevin into the soil. This will get rid of the larvae.

5. Finally, if nothing else works you may need to completely repot your plant(s). The appearance of gnats also means that you are using too much water. Take the plant out of the pot, empty out the soil, and place your plant back into the same pot with new soil.

Tips & Warnings

• Watch how much you water your plants. Too much watering attracts gnats and mosquitoes.

• If you use Liquid Sevin, please keep your pets away from your plants. As pets tend to drink the water out of the pots.