Category: Pests & Diseases

In the articles below, learn about the pests and diseases that can ravage a garden, and the natural ways to expel and cure them.

There’s nothing more heartbreaking than losing your garden to pests and diseases. Whether it’s a rabbit stealing carrots (excuse the stereotype, not every rabbit likes carrots…sometimes they eat your lettuce too!) or  hornworms gutting your tomatoes, or powdery mildew yucking up your pumpkins—it can feel like a major loss when food gardening is such a labor of love.

Companion planting is one solution to such chaos. This is the practice of pairing plants that are beneficial to each other. For example, the tomato hornworm hates basil, and some say planting basil close to tomatoes makes them taste better, so it’s a win-win!

You can also make a homemade bug spray for vegetable plants by mixing neem oil with dish soap and some water, which will keep bugs from attaching to the leaves of your plants, making it harder for them to get to your produce.

For bigger pests like deer and birds, you can throw nets over bushes, and put up fences around trees to deter them.

There is so much more to talk about when it comes to pests and diseases because there is an unlimited amount of doom coming for every vegetable garden, but that’s part of the fun, right? Still you didn’t plant a garden not to eat it, so there has to be a limit to how much one wants to undertake with their fruits and vegetables before they start heading back to the grocery store for watery fruits and limp veggies.

In the articles below, we dive into everything you need to know about repelling pests and diseases in your food garden, and you can learn even more about them in our How to Grow a Vegetable Garden: 10 Things Every Gardener Needs to Know Before Starting a Food Garden freebie. Enjoy!

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Pests & Diseases

10 Helpful Plants for Bug Control in Your Kitchen Garden

plants for bug control

The joy of growing a kitchen garden in your yard is imagining the delicious recipes and meals you’ll create using your home-grown herbs and vegetables. Do you know what gets in the way of that joy? Bugs. Gross, invasive, plant-eating, vegetable-killing bugs! I’m looking at you, Tomato Hornworm! I’ll never forget the first time I grew a large crop of tomatoes. I would pop outside to check on my kitchen garden and see that some of my tomatoes had been chewed, and others were missing leaves or stems were completely bare.

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Pests & Diseases

How to Get Rid of Wireworms in Potatoes

If you find small, dry, round holes in your tubers, look more closely, and you may discover wireworms in potatoes. Wireworms can cause significant damage in a garden, but they especially seem drawn to potatoes, carrots, and corn.  How can you tell that you have wireworms? And what should you do if you find them? […]

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Pests & Diseases

How to Treat Anthracnose Fungus in Strawberries

I love strawberries. They’re the perfect little fruit, too. You can cool off on a hot day with a glass of strawberry lemonade. They make a wonderfully sweet addition to yogurt at breakfast. Strawberries work well in a salad with a splash of balsamic vinaigrette. And, of course, you can never go wrong with a strawberry and rhubarb pie!

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Pests & Diseases

What is Eating My Cilantro Leaves?

If you love good guacamole, you probably already know who is eating your cilantro – everybody! Cilantro is thought to be one of the first herbs enjoyed by humans, going back at least as far as 5000 BC. Well, except for the 25% of people who think it tastes like soap, but for the rest of us, cilantro is a staple in good cuisine! Then you have the bonus: their seeds—also known as the spice called coriander. 

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Pests & Diseases

How to Stop the Japanese Flying Beetle From Destroying Your Garden

The Japanese flying beetle is quite the looker. The metallic green head and shiny copper wings make it look more like a jewel than a garden-destroying invader. Since the beetle’s accidental introduction to the United States in 1916, it has spread and flourished across most of the country.

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Pests & Diseases

How to Stop Botrytis Rot from Killing Your Artichoke Harvest

You’ve likely come across Botrytis rot, otherwise known as gray mold, on your fruits, vegetables, or other plants at some point. In cool, damp conditions, the fungus Botrytis cinerea can spread quickly and infect anything from blueberries and strawberries to eggplants, onions, carrots, beans, and artichokes.  In fact, as far back as 1918, Botrytis rot was a […]

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Pests & Diseases

How to Treat & Prevent 5 Common Vegetable Diseases

As gardeners, there’s no shortage of disappointments out there waiting to swoop in and ruin the enjoyment of your garden. Rabbits may eat your strawberries, seeds may never germinate, and your nosy neighbor might tell you all the ways he thinks you’re planting your cucumbers wrong. But vegetable diseases are on another level. 

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Pests & Diseases

10 Pest Repelling Plants That Keep Bugs Away Naturally

My first garden was a success…almost. I remember watching the tomato leaves develop little buds that soon turned into tiny little green tomato babies. My zucchini was just starting to blossom. And the cucumbers! There were so many cucumbers! What I didn’t have in my garden, however, was a variety of pest repelling plants. And because I found out too late that I needed some of those plants, my garden soon turned into a very disappointing learning experience.

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Pests & Diseases

5 Reasons to Try Soil Solarization This Year (and 3 Reasons Not To)

Ta-da! That’s what my daughter says when she presents a magic trick. Pull a coin from behind my ear, and you’ll soon hear “ta-da!” A rabbit pulled from a hat is accompanied by expansive gestures and, of course, a hearty “ta-da!” So what’s that got to do with soil solarization? Well, it’s kind of like […]

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Pests & Diseases

How to Repel Rabbits from Plants

Rabbit in the garden.

Rabbits are the most adorable little critters. They twitch their little noses and hop around, making the world around them seem like an idyllic meadow, even if you’re in an urban or suburban setting. That’s all lovely – unless they’re eating your garden