Lawn pests are the epitome of frustrating. Weeds are enough to deal with, and now you have bugs and other pesky creatures destroying plants, as well as your lawn. If you don’t catch them fast enough, moles, webworms, and more can take over your yard. It will destroy the root system, leaving ugly, dead patches all over the place. Thankfully, because they are so common, it’s very easy to get rid of them. Here’s how you can control some of the most common pests.
Moles
Some consider moles kind of cute, with their little nose and squinty eyes. Whether you believe that or not, moles make their homes burrowing underground. This burrowing will leave mounds of soil and raised ridges around the lawn. To get rid of them, mix six ounces of castor oil and two tablespoons of a vegetable or oil-based detergent in one gallon of water. With either a spray bottle or a hose sprayer, saturate the spots the moles are digging. This is a humane way of getting rid of the moles. All this mixture will do is upset their stomachs and make them a little itchy.
Japanese Beetles
As adults, these beetles have green and gold shells, but as grubs, they’re virtually invisible. You see them after dead patches of grass start showing up where they’ve fed off the roots. To get rid of the grubs, you have to get a natural bacteria called milky spore that will end up killing them. As their bodies decompose, even more spores will be released, helping eliminate any other grubs.
Webworms
Webworms are night dwellers making them very difficult to spot. Similar to the Japanese Beetles, you realize they’re there from the apple-sized dead patches of grass. Thankfully, they’re easy to get rid of. With soapy water, pour it into a root system, forcing them to come to the surface. After that, they can be raked up. To make sure your lawn survives the soapy water; be sure to irrigate.
