Long gone are the days when growing grapes was considered a privilege for residents of exclusively southern regions. Now, thanks to the work of breeders, these sweet berries can be grown in summer cottages, even in the middle lane. But, unfortunately, the vineyard is often attacked by wasps and bees.
If you do not fight these insects, they can destroy most of the crop, and all work will go down the drain.
This article describes four effective ways to save grapes from wasps and bees without the use of poisons and harmful chemical solutions.
What can be processed?
During the ripening period of grapes, wasps flock to the sweet and eat berries, starting with overripe bursting fruits. You can save grapes from wasps by spraying the vines with a bitter infusion of wormwood. To do this, wormwood is harvested during flowering. The grass must be crushed, poured with water at the rate of one bucket of water for half a bucket of wormwood and left for 24 hours. Then the infusion is boiled for about 40 minutes, filtered through cheesecloth and the same amount of water is added. The broth is sprayed with grapes twice a day for a week.
In addition to wormwood, you can mask the sweetness of the fruit with a saline or vinegar solution. Proportions: 3-4 tablespoons of salt/vinegar per liter of water. It is necessary to renew spraying once a week, and also after each rain.
Among folk recipes, the method of spraying grapes with an infusion of onions and garlic is also common, but this is not recommended due to changes in the taste properties of the berries.
You can treat the grapes with Sochva. It is not a poison, but simply repels harmful insects. This is an absolutely safe product made on the basis of natural smoke flavor.
Among insecticides, the Aktofit biological product has proven itself well. They can both handle vines and put them in traps as bait.
Subject to the instructions, the drug is completely safe for plants and human health.
Also, experienced winegrowers practice fumigating places where wasps and bees gather with smoke – These insects do not tolerate the smell of burning. It is hardly possible to call this method one hundred percent, but when combined with other means, the method is quite effective.
How to protect with baits?
On sale there are special traps for catching wasps, but you can make them yourself. The most common option is a reusable trap made from a large plastic bottle.
In order to make a trap, you should unscrew the cork, cut off the neck of the bottle, turn it over and insert it back, making it look like a funnel. Various baits are placed inside the bottle, consisting of water and sugar syrup, candied jam or honey. Attracted by the delicious aroma, the wasps will climb inside the bottle through the narrow neck and get bogged down in the sticky compound. After filling the bottle, you can clean it and use it again.
Also, beer, kvass and fermented berry and fruit compotes are used as bait for wasps. To enhance the smell, it is recommended to lubricate the outer part of the trap with bait.
For greater efficiency, you can lubricate the walls of the trap with oil, and in addition to the bait, pour a solution of boric acid that is detrimental to wasps or any insecticide with a low odor, for example, “Get” or “Delta Zone”, on the bottom.
Sticky traps are also used. A layer of glue is applied to sheets of thick cardboard or linoleum, and a sweet bait is placed in the center from pieces of fermented fruit – melons, watermelons, apricots, bananas or any other. Wasps will flock to the treat and stick.
In addition to sweets, wasps are attracted to meat. Better if it is slightly spoiled. Pieces of sausage or sausages, fish, liver will also come off. This bait also attracts hornets – another dangerous “guest” for grapes.
But the bees, which cause much less harm, are not interested in meat.
It is worth mentioning here that bees cannot bite through the skin of grapes and eat only those berries that have already been damaged by birds or wasps. Given the enormous benefits that bees bring to the garden, it would be wiser not to destroy these insects unnecessarily.
There are also traps with ultraviolet lamps. The insect flies into the light, touches the grid, and is killed by an electric shock. For such devices, additional baits are not required. The disadvantage of such traps is their rather high cost. A worthy alternative is simple solar-powered mechanical traps combined with baits.
Use plant repellers
Some plants have an aroma that repels wasps and hornets. These include mint, basil, thyme, geranium, lemongrass (aka citronella), wormwood, and lemon balm. These plants are recommended to be planted in the immediate vicinity of vineyards or moistened with cotton wool essential oil and spread out in places where wasps accumulate.
Usually they form nests in attics, in pipe holes, in cracks between house floors and under barn roofs.
Plants that repel wasps also include such an exotic flower as the harmala vulgaris, which grows in the steppe regions of Asia and Eastern Europe. Bunches of dry grass are set on fire and fumigated with smoke in places where insects accumulate. Smoke is completely harmless to humans, but wasps die from it. Burning wood of coniferous trees also repels wasps well due to the release of strongly smelling substances.
It should be noted that this method in itself is effective only as a preventive measure and should be used in combination with other pest control methods.
Preserving grapes with bags
You can also save grapes with the help of special mesh bags. This is the most effective and humane way that does not lead to the death of insects.
The invasion of pests that eat the pulp of grapes, as a rule, begins in August, as soon as the first varieties ripen. By that time, you need to carefully hide each bunch in a bag made of any fabric in a fine mesh. It can be gauze, mosquito net, old nylon tights or tulle from unnecessary curtains. Also, these bags can be bought at the store. They are made from durable synthetic material in different color variations. It is better to choose neutral shades of gray and brown – they are the least attractive to insects.
Each bag must be put on the bunch so that there is enough space between the grapes and the fabric for free air circulation. This process is quite long and laborious, but what to do – the result justifies the effort. Make sure that grape leaves do not get into the “cocoon”, which can begin to rot.
In addition to separate bags, you can use a large protective net that will protect the bunches not only from bees and wasps, but also from birds pecking at the berries. It must be fixed on the upper crossbar of the trellis around the entire perimeter of the vineyard on both sides so that the net hangs freely to the ground.
