How to fight mole crickets: photos and descriptions

What kind of insect is a mole cricket?

This pest inhabits the soil where vegetable crops grow, particularly the first shoots of cucumbers, tomato seedlings, and cabbage. The insect eagerly feeds on the roots of plants, causing them to wither and die. This pest's appearance is quite frightening: an adult can reach eight to ten centimeters in length, with the upper part of its back and head covered in scales resembling a shell. Its abdomen is soft, and its dark brown color allows it to hide perfectly in the soil. Thanks to its limbs, this insect can dig deep tunnels even in compacted and hard soil, although it is most often found near a moist and loosened soil hole. If your tomatoes are not setting fruit, then read on. What to do if tomatoes are blooming but not producing fruit?.

Several folk remedies against mole crickets

When mole crickets appear in the garden (photos and descriptions), how to combat this pest with folk remedies is the first thing a gardener should worry about. Controlling the insect is no easy task, as mole crickets can burrow several holes at once, requiring the gardener to find all their burrows and remove them using any available methods. When these harmful insects begin to infest the garden, gardeners begin to look for folk remedies that will help quickly and safely remove these uninvited guests.

If a gardener can use a combination of methods to combat mole crickets, these insects will become less frequent visitors to the garden, and they won't linger for long. It's worth considering several effective methods for controlling pests in garden beds without the use of chemicals.

Mechanical method of soil treatment

If a gardener manages to dig up their garden in early spring or late fall, they'll uncover numerous nests and destroy existing tunnels. This means the mole crickets will have to dig new tunnels and create a nesting site for themselves where they can lay eggs and hatch their young. If plants have already been planted, the soil around them should also be loosened, but in this case, the soil should be dug down to a maximum depth of fifteen centimeters, which is sufficient to eliminate the tunnels created by these pests.

Dung traps

When mole crickets (photos and descriptions) appear in your garden, Wikipedia offers many methods for dealing with them, but it's worth adopting the most accessible and effective ones. To eliminate mole crickets, it's worth creating several manure traps, as the pests love to nest in fresh manure piles, so this bait will be deadly. In late summer, experienced gardeners will tell you how to deal with mole crickets (photos and descriptions) in the fall. For example, you can make a dung trap by digging holes and placing manure piles in them; this is where the mole crickets will come from the garden to spend the winter. You might also be interested in reading: Planting potatoes under straw: no hassle.

When the first frost arrives, the manure is removed and spread over the soil surface. This will kill not only the insects themselves but also their eggs. The fact is that the mole cricket hibernates during the winter, and in freezing temperatures, it is inactive and will quickly die from the cold. This will help protect future crops from pests. Summer bait, however, is quite easy to destroy; female mole crickets often lay eggs in manure piles, so it's important to remove the young before they hatch.

Poison-laced baits

Such baits are best used when vegetable crops have not yet sprouted, as the poison can also harm the plants. To attract harmful insects, take grains such as wheat, corn, or barley, steam them thoroughly to soften them, and then sprinkle the grains with a special preparation called "Aldrin." These baits will attract mole crickets, and when the insect eats the poisoned treat, it will die.

Using vegetable oil or plain soap and water

If pest burrows are discovered in your garden, it's essential to eliminate the mole cricket as quickly as possible (photo and description). Experienced gardeners will provide advice on how to combat these insects (video). First, make a special soap solution. To do this, take a bucket of water and add a bar of laundry soap (grate the soap for better dissolution). Vegetable oil can also be used; to do this, drop a small amount into the burrow and then pour water from a bucket or hose over the entire area. It's worth noting that you can use laundry detergent, dishwashing liquid, or any liquid soap to create the soap solution, but the solution should be very soapy. Once the solution is added, simply wait near the burrow for a while. After a few minutes, the insect will emerge on its own, as there will be no air left in the burrow.

Fabric traps

When spring arrives, mole crickets love to emerge from their burrows and bask in the warm rays of the sun. To repel these pests, place a dark piece of fabric near the burrow; it will quickly warm up in the sun. This will attract the insects to the warm area, allowing them to be quickly destroyed. This will also attract the pests to fabric traps, which are baited with tasty ingredients. These baits are checked daily, and if mole crickets are present, they must be destroyed immediately.

Beer and water traps

It might seem like beer's smell would repel most insects, but its strong aroma actually attracts mole crickets. To trap these pests, simply pour about half a can of beer into a container and bury the jar in the ground so the neck is flush with the soil. This way, when the pests are drawn to the jar by the scent, they'll fall into the jar, preventing them from escaping. If you don't have any beer, you can use regular water, but coat the rim of the jar with sweet honey; this will also attract the insects, and they'll be trapped in the water.

Barriers to protect against pests

The mole cricket is an insect that simply cannot overcome even the smallest obstacle, especially a slippery surface. This is why young seedlings can be protected with ordinary bottles. Cut a 2-4 cm circle from the bottle and position it so that the plant is centered. This prevents the pest from reaching the plant and destroying it early in its growth.

Another interesting way fight against the mole cricket — Using a nylon stocking. To do this, take the stocking and place it on the plant before planting. Since the mole cricket feeds only on young, thick roots, the mesh structure of the stocking will prevent it from reaching them, while still allowing the root system to develop successfully. If mole crickets appear in your garden (photo and description), how to control them using sounds is described below, but don't neglect the rules for protecting plants from these harmful insects.

Destruction of insects with chemicals

In some cases, all the above methods fail to produce visible results. In this case, it's worth trying the most popular chemical pest control products. This method of pest control is only worth considering if the beetles haven't been eliminated within three years. However, it's important to use this method wisely, as all products are chemical-based, and overdoing it is not recommended. Furthermore, effective chemicals can eliminate more than just the mole cricket (photo and description); this method will also show you how to deal with the larvae. The advantage of these chemicals is that they can kill not only the pests themselves but also their future offspring, meaning that just one or two treatments are enough to completely rid your garden of these unwanted inhabitants.

Most often, chemical pesticides come in the form of granules. They have a specific odor that attracts mole crickets. The insects begin to eat the "treat" given to them, and then quickly die from the poison contained in the granules. However, this method has a drawback: the granules can poison pets and birds, so the poison is sprinkled with a thin layer of soil.

Repelling insects with different means

There are several types of herbs that can help repel these insects from the garden. For example, planting beautiful chrysanthemums or simply garlic will prevent these insects from appearing in the garden beds where these plants are grown. There are also simpler methods for repelling mole crickets, such as sprinkling eggshells on the garden beds; these pests hate chicken eggshells.

Removing harmful insects from your property is not at all difficult, the main thing is to do it in time so that the mole cricket does not have time to lay eggs and hatch its offspring.