Wireworms are serious arable pests. They live in all territories of the former USSR. They feed mainly on potato tubers.
In the southern latitudes of the vineyards. Getting rid of wireworms is not easy, but possible.
What does a wireworm look like and how dangerous is it
Nutcracker beetle larvae are called wireworms or wireworms. They can be easily distinguished from all others by a hard chitinous cover.
Externally, the wire lives up to its name - it looks like a piece of wire. This is a thin multi-segmented worm with a length of 1 to 5 cm, with three pairs of short legs. Its color ranges from yellow to brown.
Larvae spend in the ground from two to five years. At the end of summer, they pupate. Beetles hatching from pupae hibernate in the ground, and in spring fly out in order to lay new eggs, from which larvae soon emerge.
They make through passages in young tubers. As a result, growth slows down, productivity decreases. A damaged environment creates a favorable environment for the development of fungal diseases and rot. Such potatoes are poorly stored.
Heavily damaged tubers are practically unsuitable for food. Harvest is dying.
How to detect wireworm in the area
Brightly colored wireworm larvae are clearly visible on dark ground when plowing or digging a site. As a rule, they live at a depth of 15-30 cm, and in dry soils they go deep to a meter. Therefore, they can not always be found in the upper layers of the soil.
If a surface inspection did not reveal anything suspicious, the presence of pests will be revealed only during harvesting. When small holes are noticeable on the tubers, like wire punctures, or thin dark passages are visible when cutting or peeling potatoes, this is a sure sign that the wireworm has settled in the soil.
An alarming signal can also be causeless wilting, a lag in the growth of the ground parts of some potato bushes.
Wireworm Prevention
Getting rid of wireworm is not at all easy.
Therefore, it is easier and more effective to take proactive measures. Preventive actions include:
- Compliance with crop rotation rules.
- Alternating or simultaneous planting of green manure.
- Larvae die when the soil freezes. Therefore, in the fall, a deeper plowing is used.
- The wireworm loves an acidic environment. In order not to create comfortable conditions for it, supplements containing lime must be added to the soil regularly (every three years).
- Periodic loosening of the topsoil can raise the eggs of the pest to the surface. The eggs of a nutcracker beetle will die under direct sunlight.
Simple hygiene rules for maintaining a personal plot should be followed. Weed regularly, do not thicken plantings, harvest crops in time, burn or take out tops and waste.
Before you bring new land to the site, you need to make sure that it is not infected, and weigh the pros and cons.
Wireworm control methods
There are various methods of dealing with wireworms:
- agrotechnical;
- chemical;
- biological;
- folk.
It is best to use a set of measures that is convenient and acceptable in specific conditions.
Lures and traps against wireworms
Collecting all the wireworms manually is almost impossible, but reducing their number is quite realistic.
Different traps for harmful worms are quite laborious, but completely harmless. Here are some popular recipes.
- On a twig, a long wooden skewer or a hard wire, plant halves of potatoes. To dig in several places in a garden where the wireworm presumably lives. Pests attracted by the smell of a fresh cut of potatoes will gather on the bait. After a few days, the traps are removed, the wireworm is destroyed.
- You can put chopped potatoes in glass jars or plastic containers. Also bury them in the ground to the neck. Periodically, contents with accumulated worms are removed, replacing with a new filling.
- To attract wirewax can be leavened cake or just crust of brown bread. They should be placed in old socks, linen bags and buried in different places on the furrows with potatoes. Such traps are updated in the same way as described above.
- Ordinary lettuce bushes can be a trap for wireworms. They attract pests. The salad is pulled out with the larvae and destroyed.
Biological and chemical preparations against wireworm
Chemical methods for controlling wireworm are divided into fertilizers and insecticides.
Under the autumn plowing, nitrogen and lime-containing fertilizers are introduced. Ammonium nitrate not only fertilizes the garden, but also fights with a wire worm. Well heals the soil potassium chloride. The dosage is calculated in accordance with the instructions for the use of drugs.
There is a mixed opinion about insecticides. Using them in the fight against potato wireworms, in order to achieve the desired result, several significant factors must be taken into account:
- The effect is noticeable after a single application, but a stable result is achieved after several years of methodical processing.
- Planting material and holes should be secured. Liquid means are better suited for seeds; granular or powdery ones will be more convenient for soil.
- Repeated use of drugs is addictive. Therefore, it is better to alternate insecticides.
Common means are Provotox, Decis, Zemlin, Kapkan, Karate and others.
There is the latest domestic biological drug Nemabakt, which is a symbiosis of the nematode worm and bacteria. In this combination, it becomes fatal for many parasitic pests, including wireworms. Nemabact is good in that a single tillage is enough for several years. It is harmless to humans, animals, bees, earthworms, etc.
Folk remedies against wireworm
For folk remedies, eliminating wireworm on the potato field, includes wood ash, potassium permanganate solution, eggshell. They are introduced into the holes or furrows during planting.
Pests feel comfortable in a putrefactive environment. This feature can be used against them.
It is enough to spread small heaps of manure, ripened tops, straw or foliage in the garden, and then remove them together with the accumulated larvae and worms.
Convinced opponents of chemistry in the infield learned to replace the purchased funds with their own prepared infusions. Nettle, celandine grass, coltsfoot, dandelions, greens left after pinching and pruning tomatoes are used as natural repellents.
A ten-liter bucket is filled with green mass, without crushing, to the top, poured with water and insisted for a week in a warm place. The infusion is filtered, diluted with clean water in a proportion of 1:10 and watered potato beds and furrows.
Crushed egg shells, onion husks, and mustard powder are also involved. This and repellers, and natural fertilizer of the personal plot.
Quickly get rid of wireworm will help ordinary table salt. It is enough just to scatter it on the surface. But this measure is unsafe for biological balance, so it should be applied only as a last resort and not more than once every seven years.
Mr. summer resident recommends: crop rotation to help from the wireworm
Elementary rules of crop rotation will help to remove wireworms in the garden.
Siderates are primarily legumes. Several grains of peas, beans or beans per potato furrow can improve the soil and increase productivity. For the same purpose, corn and sunflower are planted on plantations.
Lupine, which gardeners grow on decorative flower beds or even consider weed, also scares away pests living in the soil.
Famous orderlies in gardens and gardens are marigolds and calendula. These unpretentious flowers should not be neglected for prevention.
After the crop is harvested, it is good to sow the site with mustard. When the shoots of mustard grow, they are planted in the soil during autumn plowing.
It is good to process seeds of grain and bean siderates before planting with insecticidal agents. Eating them, the wireworm will die.
Victory over the wireworm will require fixing. This means that preventive measures will have to be followed constantly. Among them, cleanliness comes first, followed by crop rotation and helper plants. Then it’s not necessary to take out a harmful guest again.
