WICHITA FALLS, Texas (KAUZ) – With summertime here, many Texomans are tending to their gardens; and with gardens come pests.
Dwayne Peirce, a county agent with the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension, said that the first step in spotting pest problems in a garden is to keep thorough notes.
“I highly recommend using a book of some sort write down what you see, make a log and you might say something like, ”Well today I found a leaf with holes in it.” Well, one leaf’s no problem, but then three to four days later when you’re scouting again you might find multiple leaf’s with holes so you want to keep a chart keeping track of that,” Peirce said.
Pierce said that the Wichita County master Gardeners are a great resource if gardeners need help.
Master gardener President Georgia Spoonemore spoke about which pests to keep an eye on.
“Well they should inspect their plant first of all and keep inspecting their plants to see any damage see whether their losing the green color,” Spoonemore explained, “Because we have a lot of like aphids, white flies, and different things that suck the chlorophyll out of the plant now. You also got to look for eaten leaves.”
Wichita County member Ed Bond said that there are effective natural remedies that do not harm the garden’s habitat.
“There are some good natural ones to use, the main one that I used is neem oil is pretty simple to use. It’s all natural product, you mix it with a gallon of water, you put in a little detergent so it will stick to the leafs that you’re spraying,” Bond said. “And that will eliminate a lot of the aphids and really good on getting rid of any of the aphids and some of the mold and stuff that occurs and mites.“
Copyright 2025 KAUZ. All rights reserved.