Gardening is a great and relaxing hobby, but it also has its own problems, such as insects that love to munch on your beautiful flowers. These destructive pests can destroy your garden, making it look unappealing with plants that are far less healthy. Here are eight pests which eat flowers and how to control them.

1. Aphids Identification and Damage:

These small, soft-bodied insects can be black, brown, or pink and are generally found in green color. For plant tissues, they suck sap leading to the leaves curling and eventually turning yellow, causing them distortion. They also produce honeydew, a sap-like substance that attracts ants and can result in sooty mold developing on plants.

Control Methods:

• Introduce ladybugs, lacewings, or parasitic wasps in your garden. Aphids are the favorite food source of many ladybugs and aphid-eating insects.
• Neem Oil: Spray neem oil on infected plants. It is a deterrent and interrupts the life cycle of aphids.
• Water Spray: Apply a vigorous jet of water to plants. This is high process when used for large infestations.

2. Japanese Beetles Identification and Damage:

Japanese beetles are iridescent green and have coppery-brown wings. They feed in a skeletonizing manner, eating the leaf tissue between veins and can destroy flowers and foliage.

Control Methods:

• Handpicking: In the early morning when beetles are still sluggish, hand-pick them off plants and drop into soapy water.
• Traps: Use pheromone traps to lure and capture adult beetles. Place traps away from garden areas to draw beetles away from plants.
• Milky Spore: Apply powdered milky spore over your lawn. It is a soil bacterium that targets Japanese beetle larvae.

3. Thrips Identification and Damage:

Thrips are small, thin insects with rasping-sucking mouthparts. Such feeding nature ultimately results in silvery, speckled damage on petals and leaves, deforming flowers.

Control Methods:

• Blue Sticky Traps: Position blue cards around your property to catch adult thrips.
• Insecticidal Soap: Spray insecticidal soap on infected plants to kill thrips on contact.
• Reflective Mulch: Use reflective mulch around plants to deter thrips by confusing them with the reflected light.

4. Caterpillars Identification and Damage:

Caterpillars are the larval stage of moths and butterflies. These bugs eat everything they can get their mouthparts on, and the leaves and flowers are almost all holes with ragged edges.

Control Methods:

• Handpicking: Remove caterpillars by hand and dispose of them.
• Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt): Apply Bt, a naturally occurring soil bacterium that targets caterpillars but is safe for humans, pets, and beneficial insects.
• Row Covers: Use row covers to protect plants from egg-laying adult moths.

5. Slugs and Snails Identification and Damage:

Slugs and snails are mollusks that leave a mucous trail where they crawl. Their feeding may span a wide range of plants, leaving ragged holes in leaves and flowers.

Control Methods:

• Iron Phosphate Bait: Use iron phosphate-based baits, which are effective and safe for pets and wildlife.
• Copper Barriers: Place copper tape or strips around plant beds. This means that due to the copper, slugs and snails are repelled by an electrochemical reaction.
• Beer Traps: Fill shallow containers with beer and bury them in the soil. The slugs or snails are attracted to the beer, fall in, and die.

6. Whiteflies Identification and Damage:

Whiteflies are tiny white moth-like insects that suck on leaves from the undersides. They produce honeydew, which can lead to sooty mold and weaken host plants by sapping plant juices.

Control Methods:

• Yellow Sticky Traps: Hang yellow sticky traps around your plants to catch adult whiteflies.
• Neem Oil: Spray neem oil to disrupt the life cycle of the whiteflies and reduce their population.
• Encarsia Formosa: These are parasitic wasps that attack whiteflies.

7. Spider Mites Identification and Damage:

Spider mites are minuscule, spider-like pests that create specks and shading on leaves. One main sign of heavy infestations is the presence of webbing on plants, which can lead to severe flower damage.

Control Methods:

• Miticides: Apply miticides that are marketed for spider mites.
• Water Washing: Frequently using water to wash the plants, flushes out spider mites quickly, reducing their population.
• Predatory Mites: Add predatory mite species such as Phytoseiulus persimilis, which will eat spider mites.

8. Leafhoppers Identification and Damage:

Leafhoppers typically are quite tiny and diagonal, eating soil mineral nutrients. White or yellow specks on leaves are damages caused by their feeding, and they can carry plant diseases.

Control Methods:

• Row Covers: Growing row covers will protect plants from leafhoppers.
• Insecticidal Soap: This will kill leafhoppers on contact.
• Beneficial Insects: Use beneficial insects such as ladybugs and lacewings to attack the leafhoppers.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) Approach

IPM (Integrated Pest Management): An IPM approach uses a combination of several methods for effective control with less impact on the environment. Following are a few Integral Pest Management (IPM) techniques:

• Checking: Check plants for insect damage on a regular basis. This means that catching an infestation early on will prevent it from reaching a severe stage.
• Cultural Control: Keep the plants healthy by irrigating properly, avoiding over and under-fertilization or pruning so as to reduce chances for stress causing insect damage.
• Mechanical Control: Use the following mechanical controls to minimize pest populations: barriers, traps, manual removal.
• Biological Controls: Use natural predators and beneficial insects to minimize the population of pests.
• Chemical Controls: As a final option and in some cases as the least toxic strategy, insecticides can be used.

In learning more about the pests that prey on your flowers, all you have to do is use some helpful precautions and reduce insects so things like white gardenia will not be a part of how you enjoy them.