Make It: Natural Insect Solutions

It's summertime, and the livin' ain't always easy. We have bugs. Bugs are helpful, sometimes, in some situations. Spiders eat other bugs that bug us. Ladybugs eat little garden pests. Mosquitoes eat us. Flies bother us. Roaches make us turn pale and frantic. We like grasshoppers most of the time, but when they just fly up out of nowhere into our faces, we get a little ancy. (Not that we want to kill them; we just wish they would not jump in our faces. Bugs tend to ignore personal space.)

I don't mind most bugs, as a general rule, and I recognize that they have a place in the life-nature cycle. Still, when they venture indoors or bite my legs or munch on all of my tomatoes, it's necessary to draw a few lines. The line-drawing can be done without chemical pesticides, as you'll see here.

For garden bugs that aren't helpful:

• Dilute a couple of tablespoons of Dr. Bronner's soap (or another mild soap) in a spray bottle of water. Mist the leaves and fruit of your fruit and vegetable plants. Once the soap-water mix washes off, it won't be helpful, so you'll need to repeat this application every day or so.


• Sprinkle coffee grounds around the perimeter of your garden area or container to keep slugs and snails away. Word is they don't like the smell.


• To discourage ants in your lawn, sprinkle lime (the powder, not the fruit) all over. It's good for your soil, too.


• For bigger garden pests (possums, deer, your dog), use chili powder, red pepper powder, and/or jalapeno powder mixed with 1 part baby shampoo and 4 parts water in a spray bottle. The shampoo helps it stick, thus being more effective). Spray around your plants and the perimeter of the garden area.


• Encourage pest-eaters like frogs and lizards by creating natural habitats for them. Frogs like water, obviously, being of the amphibious world, so a water feature, bucket, or puddle will help. Frogs and lizards need a place to hide and hang out and have little froggie parties, so place a few strategic piles of limbs and sticks around your garden. They don't have to be huge, just big enough to hide a frog or two.


• Plant marigolds around the edge of your garden to repel insects, who purportedly have an aversion to either the a) smell, b) colors, or c) overall aesthetic design of the small flower.


• Consider companion planting: many insects dislike herbs such as rosemary, tansy, basil, and pennyroyal. It may be too late this year, but next year intersperse your herbs with your tomatoes, cucumbers, etc., and you may not have an insect problem at all.

For insects that bite you:

• First, reduce or entirely eliminate your use of perfumed products, which can attract the little creatures who nibble your skin. Use them again in winter.


• Take one B-1 vitamin every day through the summer; it is said to produce a natural odor through your skin (which you won't be able to detect). This odor, apparently, is to biting insects what eau de stinky feet is to us. Not attractive.


• A natural insect repellant to try when you're all by yourself: garlic (slice a clove open, rub it on your skin).


• A few natural insect repellants to try when you might be around other people: An essential oil (tea tree, citronella, eucalyptus, oregano) mixed with a carrier oil (olive, jojoba, coconut, sesame seed, etc.) and rubbed on the skin. A great way to make this part of your summer routine is to put together a bottle with an essential oil blend that smells good to you and leave it in your shower. Use it after you bathe instead of lotion, and you'll be moisturized and protected from insects. Alternately, citrus is said to deter insects, so you could use essential oil of lime or lemon, or a fresh slice rubbed on the exposed skin. I expect that the oil option would have better staying power.

For bugs in your home:

• For ants: sprinkle around dried, crushed mint, or cayenne pepper, or ground cloves, or ground citrus peel. Or make a nice little concoction of all of the above.


• For flying insects: make a rosemary and catmint tea and spray around windows and doors.


• For fleas: the herb pennyroyal is said to discourage fleas. Keep a live plant around, make a tea and spray it around, dry the leaves, crush them, and sprinkle them around, or make a wreath and put it on your pet instead of a collar... You could also try boric acid.


• For dustmites: change your home filters regularly, vacuum fabrics, cushions, and rugs often, and sprinkle tannic acid around affected areas. Note: be careful of tannic acid around children or pets.


• For roaches: The catnip tea will discourage roaches. Try boric acid for roaches as well. Note: don't use boric acid where your children or pets might get into it.


• For flies: You can make your own fly-paper or try using fresh bine boughs or pine oil. Flies don't like the smell. By the way, I read that basil repels flies, but when I put some fresh basil in a vase to discourage the flies on my front windowsill, I came back and found them sitting on the basil leaves. They didn't seem repelled at all.

Miscellaneous bug problems:

• Try feeding your pets garlic or put garlic salt on their food to rid them of fleas.


• Get a live lignum vitae plant in your kitchen to discourage flies.


• If you do get a bug bite, try a baking soda paste to remove the stinging and stop the itching.


More reading on natural bug repellants:
Try The Green Guide for natural pesticides.
Try eHow for ant solutions.
Try Earth Easy for natural pest control.
Try Care2 for repelling flies.

Image Credit: pshutterbug.