How to process potato tubers from the Colorado potato beetle?

Plants of the Solanaceae family have a malicious pest that can destroy all the foliage on the bushes in a short period. How to process potatoes from the Colorado potato beetle is the number one question for gardeners. Indeed, few tubers are tied on damaged plants, which significantly reduces productivity. Most often, solutions or chemical preparations prepared by folk methods are used to combat the Colorado potato beetle.

How to process before planting?

You can protect potatoes even at the initial stage of growing by processing planting material or holes.

Treater "Prestige" has a triple effect - it works as a fungicide, protecting the plant from diseases, it is used to defeat pests and stimulates the growth of bushes. Non-sprouted potato tubers are treated with a solution before planting. This will protect them for 50 days from wireworms, aphids, a bear and the most important enemy - the Colorado potato beetle.

Onion peel is a folk remedy for repelling pests. Before planting potatoes, the husks are poured with boiling water and insisted. A handful of ash is first poured into the hole, then a little onion infusion with pulp is thrown and only then the planting tubers are placed. Colorado beetles do not like the smell of husks, so they damage bushes less.

What preparations to use during the period of potato growth?

During the growing season of potatoes, the choice of preparations for fighting beetles is very large.

• Insecticides.

"Bankcol" is an effective remedy against striped pests. One or two treatments per season are enough to completely get rid of parasites. Some gardeners claim that this drug has a negative effect on the reproductive properties of potatoes. Seed material gives weak shoots the next year after processing. It is best used only on those tubers that will be eaten.

There are other means: "Confidor", "Tanrek", "Commander", "Ankara", "Corado", "Lightning". With their help, you can also defeat the Colorado potato beetle. It will take several sprays of potato beds per season. Solutions of many insecticides can be applied to the ground when watering an area with potatoes.

• Fungicides with insecticidal properties.

Bordeaux liquid - an alternative to chemistry. Spraying with this drug has a double benefit: it helps to get rid of pests and fight late blight on potatoes. The first treatment is performed on young plants 15-25 cm high. 100-150 g of lime and copper sulfate are added to 10 liters of water. Re-spraying is carried out after 12 days. The solution is prepared more concentrated: 200 g of lime and vitriol per 10-liter bucket of water. Sometimes a third treatment is needed. In this case, the amount of ingredients is the same as for the second spraying.

• Biologicals.

These funds are less hazardous to the environment and humans. Bitoxibacillin contains bacterial spores that affect the motor functions of the Colorado potato beetle. Usually 2-3 treatments are carried out at weekly intervals to get rid of pests. At temperatures up to +20 degrees, the interval is increased to 8-10 days. It is best to organize the work during the appearance of small larvae, which are more sensitive to "Bitoxibacillin".

Fitoverm from the Colorado potato beetle is an organic insecticide that is not addictive and works especially well in warm weather.It does not harm the pest's egg clutches, so at least 2 treatments will be required. A little soap is added to the solution to increase the adhesion of the drug to the leaves.

Folk remedies

Spraying with environmentally friendly plant-based solutions and dusting is usually carried out as an additional measure of protection. You can use onion infusion for spraying. It is prepared according to the same recipe that was used for spilling holes before planting tubers.

A good result will be obtained by processing with infusions of wormwood, tobacco or celandine, poplar leaves or elecampane roots, decoctions of dandelion with horsetail.

• Sagebrush. Combine a glass of wood ash and 300 g of finely chopped wormwood, pour 10 liters of boiling water. After 3 hours, processing can be carried out.
• Tobacco. Dry the stems and roots of the plant. For two days, insist 500 g of finely chopped prepared raw materials in 10 liters of water. Strain before use, add about 45 g of soap and pour another 10 liters of water into the mixture.
• Poplar. Pour half a bucket of fresh poplar leaves with a bucket of water and boil for 15 minutes. Insist, use after three days.
• Elecampane. Pour boiling water over the roots of elecampane (100 g). You can spray it two hours after infusion.
• Horsetail with dandelion. Boil 200 g of horsetail and dandelion stems and leaves in 10 liters of water for about 15 minutes. Cool, mix with water before use: 1 liter of broth for 20 liters of water.

Dusting with sifted wood ash is performed against adult beetles and larvae. They disperse about a bucket of funds per hundred square meters of planted potato plot. Work is carried out in the morning, when the moisture has not yet dried on the bushes. Before flowering, potatoes are powdered once every two weeks, and after flowering - once a month.

Precautions

When working with toxic chemicals, you should protect your health from their harmful effects.

• Perform work with special factory-made devices. You can not use improvised means - for example, spray the bushes with a broom with a solution prepared in a bucket.
• Wear protective clothing and a respirator. Cover the entire body completely, including the arms, legs, and scalp. This will reduce the contact of chemistry with the skin and respiratory organs.
• Do not exceed the dosage indicated in the instructions for use of the product. In this way, you cannot increase the efficiency of work, you can only harm. For example, provoke the appearance of chemical burns on the leaves of potatoes, get poisoned yourself, or cause the death of beneficial insects and birds. Such chemistry is poison, we must try to pollute the environment as little as possible.
• Use the tubers for food when the drug's duration is over. You can find out the waiting period if you study the instructions for use of a particular chemical.

Features of the work

Useful tips will help you organize your spraying correctly.

• To protect plants from sunburn, the treatment is carried out in the morning or evening, if possible on cloudy days.
• They choose a calm time for work in order to reduce the effect of chemistry on the human body.
• In the rain, do not spray: the drug will be washed off with water, and it will not affect the beetles.
• After work, you need to thoroughly wash your hands with soap and water.
• During spraying, do not eat food or water, do not smoke.
• The finished solution of the drug is used completely, it cannot be stored. If it is difficult to determine the required amount of the product before starting work, then it is better to prepare it in parts.
• If necessary, do the re-processing of the bushes. The timing is determined taking into account the instructions for use of the drug.
• Protection is especially important before and during potato flowering. Later, the harmful activity of parasites has less effect on the yield.
• If possible, they introduce safe methods of fighting the beetle: mechanical collection, processing by natural means, making traps.
• The drugs are changed periodically to reduce the addiction of parasites to them.

Treating tubers before planting and spraying the plants are the most popular methods of controlling the Colorado potato beetle. Chemistry will be more effective, and environmentally friendly plant products will cause less harm to humans and nature.

Additional ways to fight

You can defeat striped parasites using other methods.

• Using natural enemies.

Straw is placed in the potato aisles. Mulching protects bushes from the sun and weeds, retains moisture, and most importantly, helps to reduce the number of Colorado potato beetles. The damp environment is a suitable habitat for the natural enemies of the parasite: ground beetles, hoverflies, lacewing and ladybugs.

Turkeys and guinea fowls can be trained to feed on Colorado potato beetle larvae. To do this, from childhood, they are gradually taught to the specific taste of pests. A little crushed beetles are added to the bread, the mixture is stirred and fed to the birds.

• Mechanical collection of pests and larvae.

In small household plots, you can manually collect first Colorado beetles, and later - their eggs and larvae. This method is not very convenient to use: you need to carefully inspect the plantings almost daily, spend a lot of time and effort. There remains a high probability of not seeing all the parasites. You can easily miss the moment when the voracious larvae hatch and eat all the foliage on the potato bush.

You can make the task of collecting Colorado beetles easier with a homemade scoop. It is made from a piece of roofing iron. The finished scoop should have a width of 50 cm, and a length and height of 40 cm. Bend in the front part so that the pests do not crawl out. A long wooden handle is attached to the end of the scoop. Insects are shaken in a scoop and destroyed.

• Planting repellent plants.

The smell of sage, tansy, mattiola, catnip does not like the Colorado potato beetle. You can plant these fragrant plants in the aisles of potatoes to scare off pests. However, it is worth remembering some nuances. Eating large quantities of tansy can poison livestock, so it is used with caution as animal feed after mowing. Cats react specifically to catnip, falling into narcotic excitement. When in contact with a plant, an animal for about 10 minutes can purr loudly, perform convulsive movements, bite the leaves of a flower, and shake its head. This information is taken into account when sowing catnip. Before flowering, the tops of the aromatic plants are removed to prevent spontaneous dispersion. Seeds are not harvested from matthiola, they can be collected and used for sowing on the site next season.

Onions, garlic, beans, and calendula are also unpleasant for the Colorado potato beetle. They are planted between potato bushes or along the perimeter of a plot with plants.

• Pest traps.

Along the border of the potato field, a V-shaped trench is made with an inclination of 50-90 degrees. The depth of the ditch is not less than 30 cm, the width in the upper part is 15-60 cm. A plastic film 1.2-1.8 meters wide is placed in the trench along the length so that its middle part is at the bottom of the ditch. The polyethylene is pressed tightly against the walls and smoothed out, straightening the folds. Holes are made from the bottom and sides of the film with an interval of about 3 m so that rainwater does not accumulate inside. The edges of the polyethylene are sprinkled with earth for a secure fix.

In early spring, Colorado beetles are still weak and do not fly. They crawl out of the ground after wintering and move in search of young potato leaves. Once in the trench, the parasites cannot get out of it and die. It is important to set the traps early, before the Colorado potato hunt begins. The method will work if the crop rotation is adhered to on the site. It is necessary that potatoes are not grown there for at least a couple of years.In late spring and summer, such a trap will not be effective - the mature insects will begin to fly en masse. But the method can be used against large larvae if the harvesting ended earlier in the neighboring areas.

At the beginning of the growing season, a few days before the first shoots appear, 1-2 buckets of potato peelings are scattered over the site. Colorado beetles flock to the bait. They are collected and destroyed.

Processing potatoes from the Colorado potato beetle is an important measure in plant care. The choice of remedies depends on the number of pests, personal preferences, financial capabilities, availability of free time, potato variety and other factors.