Homemade Pest Control - Maintain Robust Plant Nutrition

Without a homemade pest control strategy, why do sapping insects attack a plant?

In a word, “They are invited”.

Just as predators prey on weak and sickly animals, God has created sapping insects to remove malnourished and inferior plants from the system. How do insects know if a plant is malnourished? Through the infrared frequency they emit.

According to research done by Bruce Tainio of Tainio Technologies, a plant that has the full spectrum of micronutrients and the right balance of calcium, potassium, magnesium, sodium and hydrogen has a pH of 6.4 in the juice of the leaf. At this pH, the plant emits an infrared color at the frequency of 660 on a nanometer. When sapping insects sense this infrared color, they don’t see the plant as food, and just walk away; homemade pest control without pesticides.

Bruce Tainio tells of a test they did on potatoes to demonstrate this. They used a foliar application to bring half of the field into nutritional balance. Then they released 2,000 potato bugs on each half of the field. On the first half of the field, the potato bugs didn’t even see the plants as food, and left. On the second half that was nutritionally out of balance, they ate ravenously. That is, until a foliar application (organic fertilizer as homemade pest control) was applied to the second half of the field, and the plants on that side were brought up to nutritional balance. Then the potato bugs stopped eating those as well.

Therefore, the key to stop sapping insect problems is to achieve a 6.4 pH in the juice of the leaf. Low pH is generally caused by a shortage of calcium or potassium, which the plant needs for cellular construction. When this happens, the plant compensates by using more Hydrogen. This increased use of hydrogen causes a lower pH in the plant, and a higher infrared frequency. As the infrared frequency reaches 720, insects receive the message from the plant that it is a sick, nutrient deficient plant, and it is dinner time. Using an insecticide is like putting on a band aide and covering up the problem instead of addressing the problem, which is a nutritionally inferior plant.

Here is a quick and fairly easy way to eliminate most sapping insect problems. First, apply a full spectrum of micronutrients in a foliar application. Concentrated sea minerals that are low in sodium work well for this. Low sodium means you can apply much more without burning the plant, and micronutrients from the sea are nicely balanced, without too much of any one mineral. In many instances, just applying the sea minerals alone may eliminate many sapping insect problems, since sea minerals not only have a full buffet of trace minerals, but are also high in potassium and magnesium.

Second, balance out the Nitrogen, Potassium and Calcium in the plant. To do this, first send leaf tissue samples to a laboratory. Don’t pick old leaves or young leaves, but in between. Put them in a paper bag (a bag that can breathe, so they won’t mold) and send them off for analysis. Use your own lab, or you can send them to Midwest lab in Omaha, NE. Ask them to do a plant test complete. When you get the lab results back, look for are the percentages of Nitrogen, Potassium and Calcium. These three should be roughly the same percentage. If one or two are low, feed these nutrients to the crop in a foliar application to help bring the three into balance. In our experience, low leaf pH isn’t usually a shortage of nitrogen, but a shortage of calcium and potassium. For foliar applications, potassium sulfate works well for applying potassium, and calcium sulfate is the calcium of choice. Within days of this application, sapping insects may walk away!

For long-term homemade pest control, you will want to balance the nutrients in the soil. First, you want a good amount of humus in the soil. You can build humus up through adding organic matter and encouraging good microbial activity. Humus is like a sponge that allows the soil to hold more water and nutrients. Second, send soil samples off to the lab, then work on building up the following nutrients to these percentages: 70% calcium, 15% magnesium, 7.5% potassium, and 2% sodium. Avoid heavy applications of nitrogen, as the plant picks nitrogen up much easier than it does potassium and calcium. The plant can substitute nitrogen for potassium and calcium even when the soil has the proper balance of Ca, Mg, K, and Na.

It may take a few years to get the proper balance of nutrients in the soil, but foliar applications as described above can help you to quickly balance out nutrients in the plant while you work on your soil. What is a possible result of this balance of nutrients? Sapping insects just walk away.

Maintaining balanced plant nutrition is your only long term homemade pest control.

Organic Fertilizer - Maintain Plant Health

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