Keep Pests Out Of Your Garden With This Simple Newspaper Hack

Extra, extra, read all about it! Gardeners are always searching for effective, eco-friendly methods to protect their plants from pests. Surprisingly, a common household item — newspapers — can be a powerful tool in this battle. This simple hack leverages the unique properties of newspaper to create an inhospitable environment for many garden pests, ultimately safeguarding your plants. But how exactly does this method work, and why is it so effective? The answer lies in the combination of physical barriers and natural deterrence provided by the newspaper. By creating hiding spots and traps, newspapers can attract and trap pests like slugs and earwigs, reducing their numbers significantly.

This method not only helps reduce pest populations but also minimizes the need for chemical pesticides, promoting a healthier garden ecosystem. Utilizing newspapers in this way is a straightforward, cost-effective strategy that can make a significant difference in maintaining a pest-free garden, ensuring your plants remain healthy and vibrant throughout the growing season. Similarly, newspaper can be used in your mulch to reduce weeds, among other methods. 

Earwigs and slugs are nocturnal and thrive in damp, dark environments. By creating simple newspaper traps, you can significantly reduce their numbers and protect your plants. To target earwigs, roll up damp newspapers into tight cylinders and place them around your garden beds in the evening. Earwigs are attracted to the dark, moist crevices within the rolled newspaper and will crawl inside to hide. In the morning, collect the newspapers, which will be filled with earwigs, and dispose of them away from your garden or place them in soapy water to kill the pests. Repeat this process nightly until you notice a decrease in the earwig population.

For slugs, create newspaper shelters by laying flat sheets of damp newspaper on the soil surface around your plants. Slugs will seek refuge under the newspapers during the day to avoid sunlight and predators. In the morning, lift the newspapers to find the slugs hiding underneath. Collect and dispose of them to reduce their numbers. This method is particularly useful during wet seasons when slug activity is high.

Incorporating newspaper as mulch can further deter slugs. A thick layer of newspaper mulch creates a physical barrier that is difficult for slugs to cross, protecting your plants. Ensure the newspaper is moistened and covered with organic mulch like straw or wood chips to keep it in place and enhance its effectiveness. Another method for slug deterrence is using broken egg shells carefully placed in your yard. 

While using newspapers to trap and remove pests like slugs and earwigs is effective, there's another dimension to this approach: encouraging beneficial insects that naturally control garden pests by using newspapers as mulch. Beneficial insects such as some beetles, mites and centipedes play a crucial role in maintaining a balanced ecosystem in your garden. Good mulch can help create a favorable environment for these helpful allies, enhancing their effectiveness in pest control.

Newspaper mulch provides a cool, moist habitat that attracts beneficial insects. Ground beetles, for example, thrive under the protective cover of mulch. These beetles are voracious predators of pests like slugs, cutworms, and aphids. By fostering a habitat for ground beetles, you can leverage their natural predatory behavior to keep pest populations in check.

Additionally, predatory nematodes, microscopic worms that live in the soil, can benefit from the improved moisture retention and organic matter provided by decomposing newspapers. These nematodes attack and kill soil-dwelling pests such as grubs and root maggots, reducing the damage these pests can cause to plant roots. Furthermore, newspaper mulch can attract other beneficial insects, such as spiders and centipedes, which hunt various pests. The shelter provided by the newspaper layer offers these predators a safe place to live and hunt, increasing their presence in your garden.