The need for insecticides in your survival garden

RedneckContributor - July 29, 2021

Advice

I’m a long time gardener that has a small vegetable garden, that provides lots of great food for my wife & myself, plus we have a rather large orchard (over 150 trees).  As a prepper, I plan for an extreme scenario, where possibly for a year or more, we might have to become self sufficient to survive.  Obviously, to rapidly become self sufficient, the number one thing you need is lots of garden seed, so I keep several hundred pounds in cool storage and add approximately 50lbs per year.  Most seed will become much less viable after 3-5 years, so it is important to add new seed to your stores each year.

Sounds great, but there is something many preppers don’t plan on… battling insects when you just might need every plant to survive.  My many years of gardening has taught me one thing and that is, at least where I live, there is no such thing as organic growing for many foods.  This year has been especially bad for critters wanting to eat up my garden.  Beetles of all sorts have been especially bad from the tiny ones you can barely see to the big ones.  Squash bugs will kill any squash (or similar) within a few weeks.  Now we have army worms attacking the grass all around this whole area.

Picture this.  We have a crisis & all good preppers pull out their hoes & seed & put in a nice, big garden.  The plants start off great, but then your squash starts dying and most of your other plants’ leaves start looking like swiss cheese… full of holes.  What good are those seeds & implements if you can’t control the bugs?

My solution is insecticides.  Yes they have all sorts of bad connotations, but if you really want to protect you food, and possibly your life, you will need them.  Some insecticides are much safer than others.  Spinosad is my go to insecticide, as it is one of the safest & some folks consider it organic.  If applied properly, around dusk when the pollinators have left, it will only kill insects that bite into the plant… the bad guys.  Once dry, it doesn’t harm the other insects & pollinators… the good guys.  I purchase a quart of Conserve SC, which has a very concentrated amount of Spinosad for under $200.  1 oz of that makes 10 gallons, so that single quart can make over 300 gallons of insecticide.

Another rather safe insecticide is Cypermethrin, is a very concentrated synthetic pyrethroid that kills insects on contact.  It is considered very safe & safe around animals.  That same chemical is used in my fly spray system in my horse barn.  I’ll be spraying that tomorrow on my grass to kill the army worms.  It only takes 3 oz per acre.  Another contact killer I use in my garden is BioAdvanced Vegetable and Garden Insect Spray Concentrate.  I use this as little as possible.

My point is not to push any specific insecticide.  I too keep lots of insecticide soaps & oils, such as Neem oil.  I’m just letting you know some of what I use.  My point is to remind any prepper that plans on growing their own food, that they really need to have insecticides on hand… and a lot of it.  Besides having it on hand, it would be nice if you have some experience using it prior to a crisis, where a mistake can mean you and yours going hungry.  I’ve found soaps & oils can be effective but sometimes you need something a bit stronger, at least IMO.

65  

Good morning Redneck,

This is appreciated both for the info and the timing.  Am about ready to get some stuff from the bix box stores (milimal mail order operations here; must keep arriving UPS trucks to a minimum along with few financial transaction on web).

A question;

Is there any “go on the alert” when reading a label on an insicticide ? I know about Roundup brand scare stories and don’t use Johnson and Johnson powder outside. For example, are there prominent chemical names that are “buried” in the label and should be avoided ?

…….

I’m an avid lover of honey bees and this year allowed the wasps to get even more housing units here since they dine on that 17 year cycle bug.  

 

I’m no expert in this field.  It is my understanding the government has removed all the old, really dangerous insecticides.  But any chemical can be dangerous, especially if not used properly.  The section of the label I pay the most attention to is the part that tells you how long before harvest you can apply.  Spinosad is pretty short, like something like just a couple of days. 

Most insecticides are contact killers and will kill everything on the plants… both the good & bad insects.  That is why I prefer Spinosad.  Same chemical that is used in the pills you give dogs to control fleas.  It doesn’t hurt he dog but kills anything that bites the dog.  However, if you have an infestation and are going to lose most of your crop, one needs to be able to fight back with something quicker & stronger.

Speaking of infestations, when you notice an attack & you treat the plants, keep in mind generally you are only killing the adults… not the eggs.  So you need to come back & retreat every 2 days or so to get the new hatchlings.  Then after a few treatments, you should be clear of that pest… until the next attack.

 

Good morning Redneck,

This is a real good focus for me.

Thank you,

Ref the dog pills, will ask my instructors at the Virginia 3 day SART – State Animal Rescue Team course – for some specifics.

Will now be going to local area big box stores in re Spinosad.

 

Comfortis is the brand name for the dog flea treatment.

Also, the big box stores, if they carry spinosad, it will be very diluted.  That is why I order the very concentrated product online.

 

Appreciate this tip, Redneck.

Will check for some sources from the vets who ran the SART course I took. Mustavoid web ordering. It can take > hour every time I log in to remove the advertising.

 

Thank you for the great topic as always Redneck. Luckily I have not fallen victim to insect invasions of the small gardens I have had over the years, but better to be prepared because that could change at any point of the year. Especially as more people garden which will produce more food for the invading insects to repopulate and spread.

Hope you don’t mind me expanding the title of this forum topic. Thanks again for the good post.

 

My point is twofold actually.  One, that insect invasions are typical and if untreated, can destroy an entire crop.  Two, that during a crisis, you will likely be unable to run to the store to get your insecticide. 

Preppers that plan on growing food during a crisis need to have plenty of insecticide already on hand… as well as your seed.

 

I work on the system of sprays if necessary, but try to keep things as natural if possible. The first thing for me is to include variety, plant disease resistant varieties if possible and cater for the beneficial insects to keep the sprays to a minimum. The old permaculture phrase – I do not have a slug problem, I gave an lack of ducks. Hope for the best but plan for the worst.

 

Same here.  I use as little chemical as possible & only use it when necessary.  For example, I’ve never had to spray anything on my blackberries but this year, small beetles really did a number on them.  Only thing I put on my corn is a single treatment of spinosad on the young silks of developing ears.  This prevents the corn earworms from doing their damage.

Disease resistant varieties can be nice but I’ve yet to find a disease resistant tomato… no matter what the literature says.  But that is a different issue than insect infestations.  Insects can easily kill or harm a disease resistant plant.

I think a lot of folks think all insects are bad so they just haphazardly spray strong insecticides.  Kinda like the folks that think all snakes are bad, so kill them all.  So like you, I use chemicals and use them sparingly, always with the thought to do the least harm to the good insects… ones that pollinate or eat the bad guys.

 

Good topic. So if I start getting bugs attacking my plants would the Spinosad or Cypermethrin be a good all-purpose insecticide or do you have to research which insects are bothering you and then look for an insecticide specifically for that species? 

 

IMO, they both are excellent and both are some of the safer insecticides for you & other animals.  Both are derived from natural chemicals.  Your synthetic pyrethroids are based on the natural occurring chemical found in Chrysanthemums.  Spinosad is based upon a chemical that was in soil bacteria in the Caribbean. 

They have different actions.  Spinosad, when applied properly, only kills bugs that bite the treated plant.  Your pyrethroids are more of a contact killer.  So it really depends on the situation.  If I have a bad infestation, a contact killer is called for.  It will act very quickly.  Otherwise, I’d 1st use spinosad.

I personally don’t research the species of the pest.  My main pests are worms that attack tomato plants & corn ears.  Spinosad works great on them.  Squash bugs are offspring of the devil.  A contact spray works best on the adults where spinosad is best on their tiny young.  Beetles attack anything that is green, so I often use a mix of both.

Spinosad is great to use when you don’t see many pests.  It can stop an infestation before it gets going.

 

I also use spinosad and it works pretty well, though it hasn’t done much to stop Japanese beetles this year.

I’ve been researching more sustainable ways to ward off insects. A lot of hippy-type gardeners will say you only have insect problems if your ecosystem is unbalanced, though they’re usually pretty vague about how you manage that. Though I have found that diversifying plants in a bed does wonders for limiting insect damage.

I’ve heard of growing tobacco to use as a natural insecticide. Of course, that has a number of downsides like tobacco mosaic virus and the fact that tobacco is just hard to grow.

Of course, there are the biodynamic preparations, but that’s a whole other universe lol

 

We’re trialing kaolin clay spray on a couple of antique, highly susceptible (pest/disease) apple trees.  So far it looks like it’s doing a great job.  One of the side benefits is that it’s protected the trees/fruit from sunburn in epic heat waves.  It’s been fairly affordable as well.  Protecting these giant trees with sprays hasn’t been financially sustainable for the most part, at least with “organic” sprays.

 

It’s kind of a prevention thing, but I spread milky spore over my yard/garden and it’s really reduced the amount of Japanese beetles.  It’s a little expensive, but lasts for 10 years.

Another idea – since they just fall off the plants when you shake them, is there a way you could put kiddie pools of soapy water under the trees, then shake the trees?  That might be too labor-intensive for the amount of trees you have, though.

How about house cleaner spray?  The kind you attach to a hose to clean a house?  It doesn’t matter whether you use insecticidal soap or regular soap, it’ll still kill the buggers.  Just make sure that you’re spraying in the evening because it can damage the leaves if you spray during the day.

 

I bought some milky spore for that bed. It takes a while to kick in, but I figure with all the beetles I have it’s going to be full of grubs.

 

Do you have squash boring beetles?  I can’t find anything that works against those things!  I just gave up on growing squash.

Also, I have barely any cucumber beetles, but I get fusarium wilt every time I try growing cukes.  Any ideas?  I do bleach the soil when I get the wilt (old trick from a florida gardener).

Here are a couple of organic things that really work well for me:

1.  Crushed egg shells sprinkled on the soil kill slugs and snails and act as an aphrodisiac for the worms.

2.  Sprinkle corn meal over tomatoes to prevent diseases.  It also kills ants.  Ants encourage aphids, so that’s kind of an a=b=c kinda thing.

3.  Half a stick of Double mint gum (has to be that brand) in the hole of a burrowing animal (mole, gopher, etc) will kill it.

4.  Prevent birds and squirrels from eating your tomatoes by hanging red christmas bulbs on your tomato plants while your tomatoes are still green.  Go with the plastic ones.

 

Between the disease and bugs, my cucumbers are done. That is ok by me, as I’m not a real fan.   And yes, I have squash bugs.  Many years I don’t grow squash because of those beasts.  This year I’m mixing spinosad and that BioAdvanced garden spray together & spraying twice a week.  My zucchinis look great and are bearing heavily.

 

Squash bugs are different than squash boring beetles.  Squash bugs are bad, too, but the borers are my nemesis. 

 

I suggest next time you try growing squash, that you give my mix a try.  It provides dual action by having a contact killer plus having systemic action for the bugs that bite or bore into the plant.    Granted, it goes against my main thought of using as little chemical as possible, which I do everywhere else.  Squash and similar are just another issue all together.  No matter what I do, or how much time I wait, soon as squash start maturing these damn bugs attack & kill.  So if we are gonna eat squash, we have to spray heavily.

I do make a point of spraying right after I pick, so that all the mature squash hasn’t had any spray for around 3 days or so.  You wouldn’t want to spray & the pick soon after.

 

I’ll give it a try next year.

 

Candles, this is just a thought.  You can buy “nylon stockings” for apples as a physical barrier to pests – not to practical, really.  But since squash are generally not as numerous as apples, could panty hose, cut up and slid over squash serve as a barrier to your borers?

We’re having great success with kaolin clay spray on our apples this year, keeping codling moth and I think, other types of borers off the fruit.

 

Squash borers go after the stems, not the fruit.  Otherwise that would be a good idea.  Another forum recommended BT injections.  One nice thing about BT is I can learn how to make it from rhubarb leaves.

 

Hi, locally we use peppermint pelargonium planted under apple trees to prevent codlin moth. Apparently they hate the scent and therefore don’t winter at the base of the tree.

 

That’s good to hear that scent based insecticides work for you. We tried various smelling stuff, I think it was peppermint as well, on some ants at our house and they didn’t care at all. 

 

Personally I think that if TSHTF pesticides and herbicides are going to be absolutely ESSENTIAL as it is likely that every morsel of food we can grow will be needed, We wont be in any position to allow wastage and spoilage.   We are going to HAVE to be totally brutal with our dealings with pests be they Bugs, Rabbits, Raccoons, Fungi or Blights.  

 

Amen to that

 

Clarification time, Just so long as we dont kill of the pollinators.

 

Again, Amen.  I never spray insecticide in my orchard while trees are blooming and I only spray insecticide in my garden at dusk… when the pollinators are gone for the day.  That is the beauty of spinosad, in that once dried on the plant, it only kills the bad bugs that bite the plant.

 

Another one that I just remembered – if you have a plant disease, many times it can be cleared up with a spray of 1tsp baking soda per 1 qt water.

 

So do many plant diseases come from a topical external force rather than through the roots and internally? Sounds like spraying that baking soda and water solution would only clear up external diseases.

 

From my understanding, many plant diseases are in the soil.  Some can come in thru the roots but often they get on the plant by rain or watering splashing soil on the young plants.  I believe insects can also bring the disease from plant to plant. I personally find at the point you see the disease, it is too late to stop it.  My tomatoes for example are horrible looking… all diseased and yellow leaves on the bottom half of the plants.  I don’t worry about it, as so long as I continues watering & feeding, the plants keep putting out new growth & new tomatoes.

Insects are a different matter.  You can treat & kill off the invading pests before they kill the plant.  Every time I water or pick veggies, I’m looking for pest attacks, and when I see one, I’ll treat the plant.  With my zucchinis, which are under constant attack by squash bugs, I will scrape off egg clusters on the tops of leaves.  At the point I see lots of such clusters, I know it is time to treat the plants.  Often, when watering the plants, the squash bugs will come out on top of the plant to escape the water.  At that point, I hit them individually with some insecticide, being careful to not spray the blooming areas where you’ll find the pollinators.

 

Thank you for your response. That makes sense that bugs can transmit the diseases and also splashing rain.

 

For your tomato problem, try pulling off the diseased parts and sprinkling the whole plant with corn meal.  I know it’s a little late in the season, but your tomato plants should bounce back real quick.

 

Corn meal?? I’m not doubting you, but just curious how that helps.

 

Never heard that either.  Seems like it might attract critters.

And for me, I don’t consider the blight a problem.  To me, it is just a fact of life of growing tomatoes in the hot, humid south.  The plants look ugly, at least on the bottom half, but the rest of the plant is healthy.  I’m still picking tons of tomatoes and about the time my plants give out, I’ll be tired of eating them.  Actually, I’m about there now.  I’ve been eating an awful lot of them for many weeks.

 

It works by soaking up the excess water that’s on the plant, drying out the mold/bacteria.  I was told this by an old-timer in another gardening group.  I tried it and it worked.

The only other thing corn meal can do is kill off ants.  It makes them explode like rice does to birds.  Ants are to aphids as dairy farmers are to cows.  Without the ants to protect them, the aphids find another home.

 

I’ve been struggling with ants for some time now, so I will give that corn meal trick a try. Good that it will also prevent the aphids.

 

This year, I tried putting a Tums at the bottom of each (extremely deep) hole I transplanted tomatoes in, and they’ve been incredibly healthy. The bed was also double-dug and heavily amended with compost.

 

Tums are a good method of solving blossom end rot.  To solve it, you need the roots to uptake calcium.  I personally prefer sprinkling calcium nitrate around my plants prior to watering, a few times a year.  It gives them the calcium they need plus gives them an additional shot of nitrogen.

Either will also solve the same issue in peppers.

 

Does anyone have tips on protecting cabbage? I’m trying to grow some Chinese cabbage and every bug in the world seems to love it.

 

I don’t grow it but if I did, I’d treat every couple of days with spinosad, so that you break the hatching cycle.

 

That’s what I’m currently doing, though it’s been raining so much that it’s been hard to keep up. I’m finding that diatomaceous earth works better than spinosad.

 

We have had days of rain.  Normally, this time of year my pond is getting pretty low.  As of last week it had dropped around 5 feet.  As of yesterday, it is full with water running off the spillway.

This rain does make it hard to treat for insects. 

 

Hey Josh, would releasing the chickens in the cabbage patch help? Or would they just eat the cabbage?

 

They would eat the cabbage.

 

I’ve grown other things in the cabbage family, but not cabbage itself.  I’ve found the only way that works for me to get rid of cabbage worms is to pour a bucket of soapy water over the plant.  You’ll see the cabbage worms running out of the heads.  That’s when you know you’ve poured enough.  

When I use soap in the garden, I try to do it at dusk because it can burn the leaves in the sun.

 

Redneck, thanks to your recommendation, I sprayed my tomatoes, which were suffering from aphids, with spinosad and it worked great! I bought a small amount to start with but I was very happy with the results. I’ll definitely add it to my preps.

 

Glad it helped you.  Spinosad is a very safe chemical to apply to your garden, and IMO, should be the first choice.  I keep about a 3 year supply in cool storage.  Granted, in a crisis, I’d use it all the first year.

 

in a survival context insecticides and all other pesticides wont be available for long, where I live all these chemicals are imported and that will stop as soon as collapse happens.

our main garden problem here is snugs and snails and an evening hunt is best for them, remove and deal with them.

 

And that is the reason for this discussion.  IMO, if one is planning on growing at least some of their food during a crisis, then they need to prepare for dealing with insects as much as storing seed & tools.  I agree that these chemicals will quickly become unavailable.  That is why I keep around a 3 year supply of all my chemicals, which is their approximate shelf life.  I keep them rotated so that I currently use the oldest chemical.  

 

what happens after 3 years then?

 

Who knows?  Who knows if we would survive 1 month, much less 3 years.  Who knows if society would rebound by then?

My primary goal as a prepper is to get thru 1 full year without any outside help.  If the crisis is extended, my thought is to concentrate on the crops that can handle disease & insect pressure without chemicals.  I would hope by then we would have ramped up meat production so as to need less from the garden.  

My core crops, the three sisters and amaranth, should be able to produce with no spray, or if spray needed, using homemade soap.  I’m also switching over many of my apples, which mostly require spray, with jujube which is a no spray fruit.

 

sounds reasonable.

apart from slugs and snails we dont really have a problem with insects where I live. I dont like chemicals in normal times never mind post collapse.

I’m also not expecting society to rebound any time soon post collapse and I’m not concerned either way.

 

Another observation from many years of gardening is that if you plant more than one variety of each favorite vegetable, pests will usually show a preference for one and spare the other. Seasonally, different varieties will outperform too, as weather is always variable and you don’t know what’s coming. So in gardening as in life, have plenty of diversity for a healthy system. As Josh observed too, mixing up veggies in your beds is often helpful to confuse pests, unless they’re wind pollinated like corn which must be planted in a block for success. BTW, “Bodacious” variety of corn, while a hybrid so you can’t save seed, is delicious and naturally has very tight husks therefore has little trouble with corn earworm. 

 

We grew Queensland Blue Australian pumpkins one year.  The male blossoms attracted bucketloads of spotted cucumber beetles!  They just nestled down inside the flowers, which were then easy to close around the beetles and dispose of them.  (These pumpkins are rampant ramblers, produce giant pumpkins much akin to Hubbard squash.  So…yum!  As long as you have room for them.)

 

Weird! A reminder that however long you garden you always get surprised! How well did they store? We grew a couple Lumina pumpkins that happily lurked in our kitchen pantry for 2 years & were still sound & yummy. I couldn’t resist seeing how long they’d last. 

 

It’s been so long ago, that I can’t really remember anything about storing them.  But they are big, tough-skinned bruisers, they’d probably store a long time.  When I was in Australia I learned that pumpkin is a popular vegetable, not a pie ingredient like here in the US.  The QB pumpkin flesh didn’t disintegrate into mush like ours do and held up well in cooked in dishes like gratin, which I found to be food fit for a king. Now I’ll have to source some seeds and try them again.

 

For people growing their own food, have you encountered literature about rat lungworm (angiostrongylus costaricensis) caused by slugs being on your plants? We had such a slug infestation once that I tossed everything and started over. Still trying to figure out how to get rid of any slime that is on vegetables, if prevention fails and I don’t know it because the slug was being sneaky about its slime trail. I found exactly nothing online about how to wash slug slime off vegetables, entirely, even though it looks like my geographic area is not affected, yet. I also have not found a method of getting rid of slugs that I really like, if one can “like” getting rid of slugs. https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/angiostrongylus/index.html

 

Slugs are a pain for sure. Several companies make a slug & snail bait containing iron phosphate that doesn’t kill pets, etc. I’ve found it to be somewhat effective, although expensive. I use it on seedlings applied right on top of them and replenished until they are big enough to survive.

I’ve tried many other remedies with inferior results and finally gave up growing fragile greens like lettuce after watching my hubby suspiciously pick through his salad at dinner one too many times. A wash in salt water after harvest will get rid of most of them. Ducks will eat slugs, but also trample the garden, plus slurp up that iron phosphate bait like candy, thankfully with no ill effect except to my pocketbook. 

 

We live in slug land.  If the summer’s dry, for sure the best thing is to avoid watering anything but the veggies.  I discovered drip tape from an outfit called Dripworks Irrigation Supplies, which has an emitter every 8″.  I was skeptical, but ended up setting up a really nice, flexible drip system for the garden that keeps everything dry except the row.  Haven’t had slugs while using it. 

Now, if someone could tell me how to control “symphylans” in the soil I’d be very happy!

 

Slugs are one pest I’ve never had problems with.

 

Chemicals of any kind will be in short supply over here as most are imported and post SHTF all that will stop, so any stock of chemical will be finite, when its all used up there is no more.

we dont have much problem down here with insects as such, our main gardening pests are slugs and snails, a nightly or evening patrol collecting and dealing with these pests would be required.

 

Have you tried implementing an electric slug fence? It only requires two copper wires and a 9 volt battery.

 

Fun project, thanks for sharing! Sadly it would do nothing for the slugs already populating the soil in the pot or raised bed. 

 

You are correct, it will not do anything about the current population and will actually keep them in your bed if they are trying to get out. You will have to pull them out manually or use other methods to get rid of the current residents and then use the electric fence to deter future renters.