How to Recognize Vegetable Pests in Your Garden

There are two general classes of insects that can become pests in your vegetable garden. These are known by the way they do their work.

The Gnawers

One kind gnaws at the plant really taking pieces of it into its system. This kind of insect has a mouth fitted to do this work. Biting insects do their work, and then go hide. That makes them much more difficult to deal with. Grasshoppers and caterpillars are his kind of vegetable pest.

The Suckers

The other kind sucks the juices from a plant. This, in some ways, is the worst sort. Plant lice belong here, as do mosquitoes, which prey on us. All the scale insects fasten themselves on plants, and suck out the life out of the plants. As sucking insects they have to cling close to a plant for food you are pretty sure to find them.

The Most Common of Garden Vegetable Pests

Plant lice are common in vegetable gardens. Those we see are often green in color but they may be red, yellow or brown. Lice are easy enough to find since they are always clinging to their host.

The striped beetle, attacks young melons and squash leaves. It eats the leaf by riddling out holes in it. This beetle, as its name implies, is striped. The back is black with yellow stripes running lengthwise. 

Slugs are garden pests. The slug will devour almost any garden plant, flowers and vegetables. They lay lots of eggs in old rubbish heaps. Can you see the benefit of cleaning up rubbish? Slugs do more harm in the garden than almost any other single insect pest.

There is a trick for bringing slugs to the surface of the ground in the day time. You see they rest during the day below ground. So just water the soil in which the slugs are supposed to be. How are you to know where they are? They are quite likely to hide near the plants they are feeding on. So water the ground with some clean lime water. This will disturb them, and up they'll poke to see what the matter is.

The tomato worm is another common pest in the vegetable garden. This is a large yellowish or greenish striped worm. Its work is to eat into young fruit.

A great, light green caterpillar is found on celery. This caterpillar may be told by the black bands, one on each ring or segment of its body.

The squash bug may be told by its brown body, which is long and slender, and by the disagreeable odor from it when killed.

The potato bug is another vegetable pest to look out for. It is a beetle with yellow and black stripes down its crusty back.

The little green cabbage worm is a complete nuisance in a vegetable garden. It is a small caterpillar and smaller than the tomato worm.

For information about organic ways to control these vegetable pests, read my post 'Eco Friendly Pests Control in Your Veggie Garden Part 1' on my blog at www.blog.mightydigitaldownloads.com and 'Eco Friendly Pests Control in Your Veggie Garden Part 2' on this website www.vegetablegardens4U

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