Do you have a problem with pests eating your garden? It seems like this time of year the pests are extra hungry in the garden. Pests like aphids and spider mites can quickly munch and destroy your garden in the spring and summer months. The good news is that you can keep your garden pest free without using harmful pesticides!
We are frequently battling insects with as many flowers as we grow on our flower farm. There’s nothing worse than finding your favorite veggies or flowers eating up by unwanted garden guests. To control the problem, we use ladybugs to keep our garden pest free. This allows us to keep unwanted bugs under control without using pesticides!
Ladybugs are a great, natural alternative to pesticides. They love to eat aphids and will quickly devour thousands of plant eating pests. Now, keep reading to learn how to use ladybugs for pest control!
Releasing Ladybugs Into The Garden
In the early spring we released approximately 1500 ladybugs into our garden. Later in the summer we release as many as 18,000 ladybugs. Ladybugs are a natural pest control and they are great for organic gardening. Ladybugs will eat destructive pests in your garden like aphids, mites, white flies, and scale insects.
Releasing ladybugs into the garden is a great way to keep your garden pest free without using harmful pesticides! Ladybugs also lay their eggs in your garden. Several weeks after releasing the ladybugs, you’ll find a new emergence of hungry ladybugs waiting to eat the bugs in your garden.
To purchase ladybugs, my daughter and I went to our local garden nursery and purchased a bag of ladybugs for under $10. The ladybugs come in a small vented bag where the ladybugs are hibernating. We brought them home and placed them in the fridge. By placing the ladybugs in the fridge it allows them to hibernate until you are ready to release them outside.
How To Release Ladybugs Into Your Garden To Keep Your Garden Pest Free
You should wait until evening time when the temperatures are cooler outside to release ladybugs into your garden. By waiting until evening time to release the ladybugs, you will encourage them to stick around versus flying off.
First, you will want to water down your garden. Doing this will encourage the ladybugs to stick around longer on your plants. Once your garden has been hosed down, take your ladybugs out of refrigeration.
Next, open up the bag and gently shake out the ladybugs into your garden beds. Then, sit back and enjoy the fun as you watch the ladybugs quickly go to work throughout your garden. This is a great activity to do with your children! Kids love watching thousands of ladybugs crawl through your garden.
Ladybugs In The Garden: Keep your garden pest free
After releasing the ladybugs into the garden, they should lay eggs. These eggs will hatch in about 3 weeks. When the eggs hatch, you will have a new batch of ladybugs to help protect your garden from harmful pests. The idea is that this cycle will continue, protecting your garden all season long. I do usually repeat and release more ladybugs throughout the summer.
Do you have problems with unwanted garden guests? If so, I encourage you to consider using ladybugs to rid your garden of these pests. Let me know if you have released ladybugs before. I’d love to hear if you give it a try! Happy Gardening!
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Click Below to Watch Us Release LadyBugs Into Our Garden:
I really want to do this Jen. If I’m understanding this, you’ve already released some and then you’ll do it again in the summer. So I’m hoping I can go and get some and release them now. Thanks so much for the tips.
Kim, I’m actually having trouble finding ladybugs to purchase this year… In the past I’ve released them 2x during the summer. This year I have more ladybugs than I’ve ever seen before. If you have bugs to keep them around, they will usually stay and continue to reproduce…
Recently we renovated our old home by constructing a new room upstairs and also improved our room interiors. We also had a pest treatment in our home to be protected from rodents and other insects but was not successful. The pest control agents whom we gave contract were not much experienced and as a result, the pesticides were not effective. After a month I could find some rats and cockroaches roaming around my room. So it’s better to go for a professional pest controller.
Great post and advice. Very useful information, it clarified things a lot for us. Thanks for the wonderful blog.
Amazing idea with pest free garden , Thank for sharing.
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Before reading your blog, I never thought that ladybugs would be able to keep my garden pest free effectively, but it works. Thanks for recommending this method.
I’m so glad this helps!