A Detailed Guide to Integrated Pest and Disease Control Methods for Crops

Have you ever heard of using natural pesticides to control plant diseases? Would you like to learn about them? Let's take a look below.  Natural pesticides that can control plant diseases can be divided, according to the source of their ingredients, into four categories: plant-based ingredients, mineral-based ingredients, plant-plus-mineral ingredients, and others.

Category One: Plant-based ingredients

Plant extracts:

Wood ash:

Sprinkling it on the leaves can control leaf diseases and drive away pests. Usually the wood ash is put into a cloth bag, and when there is dew in the early morning, it is beaten with a wooden stick so that it falls onto the leaves.

Smoked charcoal:

Rice husks that are smoldered until carbonized are called coal; if they are burned too much and become white powder, they are called rice husk ash. Both coal and rice husk ash are very high in potassium and can be used as natural potassium fertilizer. Smoked charcoal mixed with comprehensive microbial brown sugar water and then mixed with compost can be used, or it can be applied directly to seeding rows or planting rows. Besides helping crops grow, it can also control soil diseases.

Loquat leaf rice wine vinegar:

Used to control soft rot of cabbage or Shandong cabbage. Pick 10 loquat leaves, soak them in 1 liter of rice wine for one month, then add 2 liters of vinegar, dilute twentyfold, and spray.

Category Two: Mineral-based ingredients

1. Slaked lime:Used to control rice blast and various other diseases. Put slaked lime into a cloth bag and beat it with a wooden stick so that it falls onto the crop leaves. It can not only control pathogens, but the leaf color will also become deeper and tougher, though too much will cause the plants to wither and die.

2. Sulfur powder:It has a history of several thousand years as a fungicide, but it does not truly kill fungal spores. Instead, it forms a thin film on the leaf surface that prevents fungal spores from germinating, so after rain the sulfur film may be partly washed off and lose its effect, and spraying must continue. Besides the aforementioned rust mites and leaves, it can mainly control brown rot, leaf spot, powdery mildew, and scab, etc.

Category Three: Plant-plus-mineral ingredients

1. Slaked lime and wood ash:Used to control wilt disease and damping-off disease of Solanaceae crops, etc. Dig a hole 10 cm away from the plant, about 15 cm deep and about 5 cm in diameter; during the fruiting stage, dig it 20 cm deep, and pour one cup each of wood ash and slaked lime into each hole.

2. Slaked lime, wood ash, and camphor:Used to control damping-off disease. Weigh 20 grams of camphor and crush it as much as possible, 2 liters of wood ash, and 200 grams of lime, then add 5-10 liters of water. When using, dig a hole 5 cm deep 10 cm away from the base of the plant, pour one cup into each hole, and cover it with a small amount of soil. Then all kinds of insects and fungi will disappear, root vitality will increase, and new shoots will soon appear.