Battling pests isn’t a one and done effort. Last weekend, I visited a local farm and was delighted to find two tools I hadn’t considered before. They had several sticky ball traps hanging at the end of rows, as well as a solar powered moth zapper near the kale. I thought both methods were absolute genius and more tools to outsmart pests.

Preliminary Use of Sticky Traps to Assess Flying Insects

Sticky Ball Traps

Using yellow sticky cards has been around for many many years to target flying insects such as aphids, white flies, fungus gnats, leaf minor, and Thrips. Thrifts being one of the major pest that are hard to treat. Yellow sticky traps are usually used to monitor the situation because some of these past are so small, or our only present in the evening, that you need to determine whether they are the ones causing the problem.

These were replaced at the end of some of the flower rows, which makes sense because often times they are prone to all of these potential pests. Yellow is a good color to use because it mimics appealing young plants. The past target this color and you are more likely to catch them.

It’s also interesting to know that there are other colored sticky ball traps. I’ve seen black ones that are used for your standard flies. And there are red ones that are focused on catching apple maggot flies.  the red balls look like ripening apples, so when the fly goes to it it is stuck and trapped. For the red sticky balls, hang them in late June or whenever the apples are beginning to change color.

Dealing with Thrips

Make Your Own Sticky Ball Trap

If you buy these sticky balls, you can clean them and sometimes use a vegetable oil to loosen any of the other dried bugs then apply fresh sticky coat of spray, such as Tangle Trap.  along this line you can also make your own. If you have a ball or even a balloon, spray it with the insect trapping adhesive and hang it where you think you’ll catch the most insects, or where you are most concerned for your plants.

One caveat with these sticky traps is they are nonselective. They will capture beneficial insects as well as harmful pests. Just keep that in mind.

Solar Powered Moth Zapper

The other tool that I thought was fantastic was a solar powered moth zapper place near the kale. Cabbage mods are the bane of those of us who love broccoli, cabbage, and even kale. Planting in the fall is a terrific way to work around the lifecycle of the cabbage moth, but many of us want these vegetables throughout the year. I thought using the solar powered moth zapper was fantastic.

The unit charges during the day storing the power in a small battery. Then, at night the ultraviolet light attracts the insects, which include cabbage moths, but also beetles, midges, and other night flying insects. Unfortunately, this does not include mosquitoes, though, and they are more drawn to carbon dioxide. 

Speaking with the woman, it’s definitely not a solution to all the pest problems, but it’s another piece that helps them reduce the amount of damage done to the crops because they’re doing everything possible to avoid harsh treatments.