Published on: April 3, 2024
Spring is here and if you are like us, you can't wait to get outside and see how your plants and garden are doing! As usual, UC IPM has useful tips for the month of April to prevent pests in the garden and landscape. To see more tips specific to your region, visit the Seasonal Landscape IPM Checklist on the UC IPM website. Here are some general tips to get you started:
- Cover fruit trees with netting to exclude birds and other vertebrate pests.
- Aphids are out already so look for them and their natural enemies such as predaceous bugs like lacewings, lady beetles, and syrphid flies. On sturdy plants, spray aphids off with a strong stream of water or apply insecticidal oils or insecticidal soaps to kill them.
- Manage ants. Plants infested with honeydew producing insects like aphids, whiteflies, and mealybugs may attract ants who take that honeydew back to the nest to feed the colony. Manage ants around landscape and building foundations using insecticide baits and trunk barriers.
- Whitewash tree trunks to deter borers and prevent sunburn. Apply to young trees or older bark on susceptible trees newly exposed to sunlight.
- Look for signs of clearwing moths boring in ash, birch, pine, poplar, and willow.
- Check for signs of powdery mildew on apple, crape myrtle, grape, rose, and stone fruits. Take preventative measures, like pruning, to provide better air circulation between plants.
- Watch for yellowjackets and other wasps building nests in undesirable locations. Knock down newly started nests and use lure or water traps to control populations.
- Prevent mosquitoes by eliminating standing water in gutters, drain pipes, flowerpots, etc. Place Bt “dunks” (Bacillus thuringiensis subspecies israelensis) in birdbaths and ponds to selectively kill mosquito larvae.
- Adjust watering practices as rainfall decreases. Check irrigation systems for leaks and broken emitters and perform maintenance as needed. Consider upgrading the irrigation system to improve its water efficiency.
- Monitor stone fruit trees for pests such as aphids, borers, brown rot, caterpillars, powdery mildew, and scale insects.
Don't see your county on the checklist or want to provide feedback? Let us know!
Public Value:
UCANR: Developing an inclusive and equitable society
Focus Area Tags: Pest Management, Yard & Garden
- Author: Eileen Linn
Published on: January 28, 2013
In celebration of the Contra Costa Master Gardeners' 30th Anniversary, we came up with 30 (plus 1) signs that you might be a gardener.
Hope you enjoy them!
- Argues constantly that compost smells sweet.
- Delays vacation travel until after the harvest.
- Dirt! In your house, in the trunk of your car, under your fingernails and on your shoes, even the good ones!
- Every vacation has a nursery and /or botanic garden involved.
- Favorite color is green.
- Gets at least a dozen catalogs in the mail - and they send you into a state not experienced since teenage dating.
- Gives zucchinis to friends and co-workers (and sometimes the postal deliverer and UPS driver).
- Home Depot and nursery's know you by your first name.
- Mountain of plastic pots squirrelled away.
- Own one too many floppy straw hats.
- People share all their plant problems with you.
- Pruning clippers in your back pocket.
- Seed collecting materials, plant holders and coffee grounds from the coffee shop in the car.
- The yard is in better shape than the inside of your house.
- There are plants waiting to be added to your garden.
- Trays of seedlings on top of your refrigerator/Cuttings in the refrigerator.
- Use Latin words in public.
- When you tour a garden you first look for their composting set up.
- Won't let anyone else prune the fruit trees.
- You drive by any lawn and think, that could be a garden.
- You have more pairs of gloves than earrings.
- You live in your Carhartts.
- You look at vehicles based on how many tools and how much soil/compost/amendments they'll hold.
- You stop talking mid-sentence when you see a plant you don't recognize.
- You try to save every puny little plant that should have gone into the compost.
- You wake up in the middle of a cold night and wonder if you should go out and cover your succulents.
- You water other people's plants when out for a walk from your own water bottle if they look thirsty.
- You'd give up a movie to trim and weed the garden.
- Your fingernails are the shortest they've been since birth.
- Your own garden book collection rivals Barnes & Nobles.
- You're in a national park and you have to resist the urge to pull weeds.
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