Let's Grow Stuff

Greetings from the garden! My name is Ben, and today we're at the Badger Rock Neighborhood Center in Madison, Wisconsin, and we're going to be talking about bugs. So, let's jump into the garden and get started. Today, I'm joined by Sarah Karlson, farm and education manager here at Badger Rock Neighborhood Center. And Sarah is going to help us understand a bit more

about the insects we'll find in our garden

the good, the bad, and the everything in between. So, Sarah, tell us a bit more about yourself and your work here at Badger Rock. I'd be happy to. So, I've been gardening for about 15 years. I moved here to Madison from Oakland, California, where my work was in food justice and urban agriculture education. So, I continued that work here at Badger Rock, where I manage our chemical-free educational farm and community garden. I also provide garden and cooking based education to Badger Rock Middle School students and Badger Rock Neighborhood Center community members. So, our produce that we grow here allows us to offer fresh, affordable produce to our Southside neighborhood to supplement the produce needs of some of the small, people of color-owned businesses that cater out of our kitchen. And we also partner with a variety of other community organizations in Madison to provide both produce and plants. So, it sounds like the farm is really at the heart of a very diverse community here, from the students and the community gardeners to the plants and the insects in the garden itself. So, Sarah, once many of us walk into a garden center, we see all of these chemicals and sprays to kill insects, which might lead some of us to think that all insects are bad. Is that really the case? Not at all. In fact, most insects are really important. At Badger Rock, we garden without chemicals, and insects help us keep our plants happy, healthy, and productive. We call these beneficial insects, and they're actually our partners in the garden. So, what kinds of things do these good insects, these beneficial insects, do for our gardens? There are two main categories of beneficial insects. The first one are the insects that eat the pest insects. We call these predatory insects. And the second group are our pollinators. Predatory insects include things like ladybugs, praying mantis, wasps, and beetles, and some of their favorite foods are some of our pest insects like aphids and caterpillars. Our pollinators are the insects that bring pollen from flower to flower. Pollinators include things like honeybees, bumblebees, and native bees. With all of that in mind, how do we know if we might have a bad bug in our gardens? Well, first of all, it's important to check your plants regularly for any signs of changes. Signs of changes that could indicate insect damage are things like holes in your leaves, chewed away edges of leaves, or puckering leaves, in the case of aphids. Often, you'll see changes in your plants before you ever see the insect itself. How do we know if the damage that we might be seeing in our garden is the cause of an insect or a mammal, like a rabbit or a chipmunk? Well, if you've ever had a rabbit in your garden, you'll know, they don't chew small holes in your leaves. They eat the entire leaf or the entire stem or often just chew your plant all the way back down to the ground. So, if I find signs of insect damage, when do I panic? When do I go to the garden center and start to get those chemicals? Well, if you're gardening organically, you'll never want to go buy those chemicals. In organic systems, we let natural systems do the work for us whenever we can. So, first thing to do is check your plants regularly. Remove any pest insects you see and then be patient. The good bugs will arrive, and they will help keep your pests in check, and you'll have fewer pests to deal with. The next step is to think about physical barriers to keep insects from landing on susceptible plants in the first place. Physical barriers can include things like row cover. That should be applied to your crops at the right time of year for the insect you're dealing with. If you're not sure what insect you might have, the UW-Extension Insect Diagnostic Lab is a great place to go. They can help you not only identify the insect you're dealing with, but also give you ideas for management. Well, Sarah, do you have any final quick tips for success the gardener should keep in mind as we're gardening with insects? Definitely. first and foremost, you want to pay attention to the health of your soil. Healthy soil gives you healthy, resilient plants. Healthy soil comes from using compost, in avoiding synthetic chemicals in your growing practices, also avoid mono-cropping. Mono-cropping is growing just one kind of plant. That is a paradise for pests. I would also suggest strive to have a variety of blooming things in your garden throughout the growing season to attract beneficial insects to your garden. Well, Sarah, thank you so much for helping us understand a bit more about the insects in our gardens. There's a whole interconnected world out there, and it's complex and diverse and beautiful. I couldn't agree more, Ben, and thanks for having me. Well, there you have it. I hope now you understand a bit more about the insects you'll encounter in your garden. So, thanks for joining me and we'll see you next time!