Identifying some common pest that will go after your homegrown onions. That’s coming up on This Land of Ours.
If you plan to grow onions, you’ll likely deal with onion pests at some point. Although alliums tend to repel many insects, some stubborn species do like them an awful lot.
- The two-spotted spider mite — also known as the red mite — is ridiculously fond of onions. Plant cilantro around your onions to help fend them off, and treat infected plants with neem oil.
- Bulb Mites are tiny but mighty and cause pretty significant damage to bulbs during the growing process. While there’s no way of treating them once they show up, you can try to prevent them. Such as rotating your crops regularly, and avoid planting large groups of onions together. And, using intercropping and companion planting methods throughout your garden.
- You’ll also need to watch for Thrips, which will leave your onion leaves transparent and silvery.
- Onion flies and maggots. The only way to prevent this from happening is to cover your young onion seedlings with agricultural fleece.
Listen to Cathy Isom’s This Land of Ours program here.