Use Pesticides Conservatively

Sometimes a barrier isn't the answer. You wouldn't want to drape a cover over a rose bush or shimmy up an apple tree with a bolt of cheesecloth. There are situations when you need to spray a pesticide.

Many plants look or produce much better if kept on a regular spray schedule. Fruit trees in particular yield more fruit if maintained this way. This should be an important consideration in the decision to plant home fruit trees.

What you spray depends on several factors, one of which is your budget. Chemical pesticides are expensive in more ways than one. Research has determined toxins, once commonly used in the garden, can cause a range of ills from birth defects to cancers. Accidental ingestion by pets and children occurs every year, with tragic results. Toxins also wipe out beneficial insects, such as bees and ladybugs. And misapplication of chemical pesticides often results in plant damage.

As with the misuse of chemical fertilizers, the biggest problem home gardeners have with pesticides is over-application. Always follow label instructions to the letter. These are not mere recommendations, they are lawit is illegal to misuse pesticides.

Each product lists what insects it is effective against and on which plants it is safe to use. A general pesticide with a wide range of applications, such as Orthene or diazinon, will handle most problems of home gardeners.

Organic pesticides, such as botanically derived rotenone, pyre-thrum, ryania, and sabadilla are good substitutes for environmentally concerned gardeners. They pose less threat of environmental damage because they break down quickly, and will not leave any long-term residues. Other examples of non-toxic pesticides are horticultural oil sprays that coat and suffocate small bugs such as scale, and diatomaceous earth, which kills bugs at or beneath ground level when worked into the soil. Many organic pesticides, unfortunately, kill indiscriminately, wiping out pests and beneficial organisms alike.

Some of the most promising pest-control products are ones that cause diseasegenerating pest-specific disease organisms that spring to life like sea monkeys when mixed with water. They only harm the bug for which they are intended. Some examples include several forms of the bacteria Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt), marketed under various brand names and effective at battling caterpillars and Colorado potato beetles; Nosema locustae, sold as Grasshopper Attack, which is a grasshopper disease that prevents successive generations; and Bacillus popilliae, or milky spore disease, that wipes out Japanese beetles.