Mark, I've used the soap on sucking insects in the past, aphids especially works well. I've also tried the pepper spray without as good as luck. Mostly, we have enough beneficials to overcome the baddies. I also have found that Japanese beetles like a certain weed, which I make sure to let grow away from my gardens. They eat that weed and leave my gardens alone.

But also watch the warning labels on the natural sprays, some of them are as dangerous as the chemical ones.

Marla

Good for you, I have been synthetic pesticide free for the past 17 years or so and rarely use organic 'cides. I do use a lot of row cover which has been very effective at excluding pests and I am big on beneficial insects.

It does take a while to build up the benficial population after years of using chemicals and before the beneficials come to your farm the past insects that also are at the bottom of the food chain will come in forst and you will have to allow their populations to build in order to attract the benficials into your market garden as they will not come to live if there is no food source.

if you try to control the past population through chemical means you will set back this process a couple of years

Thank you, B.B. I hope to pick off some of the bigger pest,s by hand,and lots of Birds around and 2-3 wild cats which should be effective against the field Mice. My homemade garlic /hot pepper spray will be most effective against the Deer and Rabbits and maybe a few insect,s.
Mark

Mark,

As a guy who use to spray potatoes with DDT and later dust them with Sevin, I'm not opposed to chemicals but I don't use them and haven't in the past three years.

Why? I don't know for sure! I suspect a large reason is that natural methods, such as Safer Soap, Neem Oil, boiled tomato plant leaves, etc., tend to work, usually better, and are just as cheap or less expensive than buying insecticides. No way have I become a Tree-Hugger but maybe as I age I can see the benefit of doing no harm, especially when it isn't necessary.

Mike

Mark one of the things you need to buy (if you do not have this already) is a good book on insect ID. I love the Audubon guides, personally. I use them a lot during the growing season and it keeps me from killing off beneficial insects that I am not familiar with.

B.B ,you know my biggest pest by far is Colorado potato beetle. In years past I walk between the rows and knock them on the ground, then I hope they get ate by birds or other insects while they are on the ground.
The second pest is Squash bugs. I have been picking them off and stepping on them. I have not seen a Tomato Horn worm yet in 6 years of growing . I have many Garter snakes and a lot of toads. We have blue jays,Robins,Red-wing blackbirds,finches and swallows mainly. I do not know about any beneficial insects as I will search online for the best predator insects all though I do have lots of ladybugs.
I have lots of those black little hard shelled bugs that hover around in one spot, I think they have a red dot.
Mark

Row covers for CPB, they do a great job at excluding 95% to 100%. I used them for several years for just this purpose and after 4 years had no CPB's what so ever on that farm.

On the farm I now own we get them but only on the eggplant and sometimes peppers and almost never on the taters. I mainly have pick eggs, larva and adults as we don't do a lot of eggplant so it is no problem to deal with 50 or so plants.