Whenever I make chilli jam or chilli sauce, the seeds have to come out — they’re too hot to leave in. Rather than waste them, I put them to work in the vegetable garden, keeping caterpillars, white fly and anything else that shouldn’t be eating my vegetables under control. This is a collection of recipes that use things you usually have around the house and they are generally not toxic, or at least better than the insecticides and fungicides that you buy from a shop.

HOME-MADE GARDEN REMEDIES
Bugs For Spray

Chilli Insecticide Spray

  • Chilli seeds (however many you’ve saved)
  • Old garlic bulbs
  • Water
  • Dish-washing detergent
  1. Grind the chilli seeds in the blender with any old garlic bulbs on hand.
  2. Add enough water to make it quite liquid.
  3. Tip into a saucepan with extra water and simmer for 15–20 minutes.
  4. Take off the heat. Add the water used to rinse out the blender, plus a squirt of dish-washing detergent (helps the mix stick to pests and leaves), and leave to cool and infuse.
  5. Strain through cheesecloth or a triple layer of muslin and keep the liquid.

Spray for caterpillars, aphids, flies, ants and mealy bugs, weekly or more often after rain. Add extra detergent if it’s running off the leaves. Test on a small area first — it can burn leaves if too strong.

Fruit Fly Bait

  • 1 tsp sugar
  • 1 litre water
  • 1 tsp Vegemite
  • 1 drop fruit fly poison
  1. Mix all ingredients together.
  2. Pour into bottles with small holes cut in the sides, or soft drink bottles with the tops cut off and inverted, and hang from the trees.

Use several around the garden, spaced a bit away from the fruit trees themselves.

Milk Spray for Powdery Mildew

For zucchini, grapevines and cucumbers.

  • Milk
  • Water
  1. Mix equal parts milk and water in a spray bottle.
  2. Spray all parts, both sides of the leaves, early in the season to prevent powdery mildew.

Mildew and Black Spot Spray

For roses and tomatoes.

  • 1 litre water
  • 2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • 2 tsp pest oil (or 1 tsp vegetable oil plus 1 tsp detergent)
  1. Combine all ingredients.
  2. Apply early in the season to prevent mildew and black spot taking hold.

White Oil

For scale, aphids, leaf miners and white fly.

  • 2 cups vegetable oil
  • ½ cup dish-washing detergent
  • Water, to top up
  1. Mix the oil and detergent in a jar and shake well to combine.
  2. Put 2 tbsp of the mix into a spray bottle and top up with water.

Organic Herbicide

  • 1 litre vinegar
  • 1 cup salt
  1. Stir the salt into the vinegar until dissolved.
  2. Brush onto weeds.

Good for weeds in the vegetable garden paths.

Algae on Paths and Paintwork

  • 1 part vinegar
  • 3 parts water
  1. Combine and spray onto the algae.

Mosquito Trap

  • 1 plastic soft drink bottle (1 or 2 litre), cut in half
  • 1 cup hot water
  • ¼ cup brown sugar
  • 1 gram yeast
  1. Mix the brown sugar into the hot water and let it cool, then pour into the bottom half of the bottle.
  2. Add the yeast — no need to stir. It produces carbon dioxide, which attracts mosquitoes.
  3. Invert the top half of the bottle into the base and tape together.
  4. Wrap the bottle in something black, leaving the top uncovered, and place outside away from where you gather. Mosquitoes are drawn to black as well as the CO2.