Homemade Herbal Insecticides for Gardens

Advantages

• Homemade insecticides for your garden are cheaper than the commercial alternative. They can be made with ingredients you have at home. These homemade products target a wide range of pests, including Japanese beetles, spider mites, scales, ants and cockroaches. Because these products rely on herbs and nontoxic products, they're safe to use in gardens where household animals, livestock or children may play.

Drawbacks

• Some herbal insecticides can be messy, and you may need to saturate plants several times a day to control the pest problem. Additionally, homemade soap sprays can harm certain plants, such as sweet pea or tomato. Soap sprays can burn plant leaves, causing equal harm and good to your plants. Some sprays can also keep away beneficial insects that eat the plant predators.

Powders

• To control ants, put out substances that naturally repel them to drive them away from your garden. Ants detest garlic, mint, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, lemon and coffee.

Sprays

• If mosquitoes frequent your garden, garlic spray keeps them away. Mix garlic juice and water in a 1:5 ratio, and then spray plants, cloth or skin with this mixture. The same garlic spray may repel other garden pests, but also drives away good insects. To combat mites, mix several drops of liquid dish soap and 2 tablespoons of cayenne pepper in a gallon of water. Let the mixture steep overnight, and then strain it into a spray bottle. Spraying affected plants thoroughly kills the mites.

Controlling Large Pests

• Homemade insecticides won't really work for most large insects, like caterpillars. To get rid of these pests, blast plants with water from a hose. The pests will drop off. Shake plants or manually pluck off offenders. To control slugs, sprinkle coffee grounds near plants or sprinkle salt directly on slugs. Garlic sprays also deter these pests.