Balancing Nature With Your Landscape

• Predation - a predator is an organism that attacks, kills and feeds on one or many other individual organisms (prey) during its lifetime. Some predators are specialized in that they feed on only one or several prey. Other predators may feed on a wide variety of other organisms. These beneficial organisms can range from tiny microbes to large carnivores such as raptors, moles and animals.
• Parasitism - parasites are organisms that live and feed in or on larger hosts. They have a specialized relationship with their prey, usually parasitizing only one host over their lifetime. Parasites that kill or significantly weaken harmful prey are important in biological control programs.
• Competition - competition occurs when two or more organisms compete for the same limited resources. Generally if left alone, the stronger or those organisms with superior numbers will thrive. Competition can become important with respect to weed control and to a smaller extent with beneficial insects, however its use in biological control is limited.

• beneficial organisms must be present in the landscape
• some damage must be tolerated in the landscape.
• a small number of pests need to be present as a food source for the natural enemies.
• chemical pesticide usage must be kept to a minimum.

• Lacewing larvae
• Plant bugs
• Earwigs
• Lady beetles
• Soldier beetles
• Wasps
• Syrphid larvae
• Aphid flies
• Assassin bugs
• Bigeyed bugs
• Damsel bugs
• Birds
• Ground beetles
• Spiders
• Minute pirate bugs
• Viruses
• Bacteria (B.t. pathogen)
• Midge larvae
• Skinks
• Anoles

• preventing pest problems from occurring.
• constant monitoring of your landscape scouting for all organisms.
• positive identification of all insects in the affected area, both beneficial and harmful.
• proper selection of chemical control using damage thresholds as a guideline to treatment.
• proper application of any pesticide using label recommendations and calibrated application equipment.

• Prevention - biological controls often suppress harmful organisms early during an infestation. As pest populations increase, beneficial populations will also increase preventing outbreaks that could cause damage. In the event that natural enemies do not achieve a level to control pest, added beneficial organisms can be released to keep pest levels low.
  
  Another way to aid in preventing pest outbreaks is through proper plant selection, position, planting and care. Healthy plants, located in areas where they will thrive, are better able to withstand minor infestations of pests and recover with acceptable damage.
  
  
• Monitoring Your Landscape - carefully monitoring your landscape on a daily basis will give you insight on plant health, beneficial insect numbers and pest counts. Monitoring techniques will vary depending on the organisms your are looking for. Insect counts can be see with the unaided eye or with a hand lens or counted in traps. Diseases can be diagnosed by using plant symptoms or submitting plant and soil material to a lab for a professional assay. Weed populations can be determined by using a rope or line to transect a portion of the lawn. Walking down the line, counting your steps and the number of weeds at each step, will give you a percentage of weed plants at the site. Count the steps where you saw a weed species then divide by the total number of steps used down the length of line.
  
  Monitoring is a key component to the IPM program. It is extremely important in understanding the benefit from biological control. It will be important to also keep good records of all your monitoring activities. These records can be used to predict future out breaks of pests allowing you to match environmental conditions and control methods. In the long run, these records will provide valuable historical data for long-term management
  
  
• Identifying Resident Organisms- accurate monitoring is of little use if you cannot properly identify those organisms living in your landscape. Natural organisms will, at times, control only a specific pest or closely related pests. Poor identification can lead to incorrect conclusions as to pest pressure and natural enemy populations. Using this incorrect information to base a chemical application on can cause a loss of needed beneficial control.
  
  
  Be sure you can differentiate between harmful pest and beneficial organisms. The inability to accomplish this can lead to a misdiagnosis and loss of valuable natural organisms.
  
  
  
• Deciding on Chemical Control - to establish a need for chemical control, threshold levels of pest population or damage should be established. This level will vary from site to site depending on landscape quality wanted. Threshold levels should follow published pest numbers or based on visual damage. Again, the IPM program will require that you tolerate some plant damage.
  
  Once you have reached your targeted threshold level of pest or damage, prepare for a chemical application. Start by choosing the least toxic chemical available. This could be something such as insecticidal soaps or using a hard stream of water to wash insects off a plant. Work your way toward contact carbamates and organophosphate chemicals only when lesser toxic products fail. Remember, the IPM program states that not every landscape needs to be treated every year for every pest.
  
  
• Proper Chemical Application - before applying any pesticide, read, understand and follow all label direction. Particularly with respect to environmental hazards and recommended rates. Applying more chemicals than recommended will not increase effectiveness of that pesticide. It will only aid in polluting the site you are spraying.
  Be sure that all application equipment is in working order and calibrated to apply the correct amount of mixture. Also, follow all recommended cleanup and disposal procedures found on the label.

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