Pests and Pest Control

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Pests and Pest Control

• Denham Springs Freshman High
• Ag. I

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What is a pest?

• Any living organism that has the potential to
  cause harm to plants.
• Ex. Insects and animals

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Insects as pests

• Often cause injury to the plant such as chewing
  leaves, mining leaves, or destroying fruit.
• There is a different insect that will attack
  every part of every single plant.

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Insects

• Have either a complete or incomplete
  metamorphosis.
• This varies between insect species.
• Important to know which insects exhibit complete
  metamorphosis for identification purposes.

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Insects

• Complete metamorphosis stages include egg,
  larva, pupa, adult
• Ex. Butterfly, moths

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Insects

• Incomplete metamorphosis stages include egg,
  nymph, adult
• Example Grasshopper, cricket, dragon fly

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What to do about insects?

• Some options include
• Pesticides
• Biological control agents (certain bacteria
  produce a poison that kills certain insects such
  as caterpillars)
• Beneficials good insects that help control
  the harmful ones (lady bugs, parasitic wasps,
  etc)
• Soaps (Whale soap or fish oil soap washes off the
  outer waxy layer of some insects and they dry out)

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Important info on pesticides!

• Three different kinds
• Insecticides kill insects
• Miticides kill mites
• Fungicides control or prevent disease organisms
• Determine what kind you need and only purchase
  enough so that it can completely be used during
  one growing season.

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Why only buy enough for one season?

• Do not have to worry about disposing last years
  problem.
• Prevents you from trying to increase the dosage
  to try to use up last years supplies.

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How to properly manage insects

• To be successful, one needs to have an insect
  management program.
• Should include
• Frequent surveys of garden (once or twice weekly)
• Know how to look for insects and their injury
• Be able to identify those you find, which is the
  key for proper pesticide application.