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In many regions of Our Country, potato plantations suffer from the invasion of the Colorado potato beetle. Adult beetles are less harmless than their larvae. They, like “red berries”, stick around potato bushes, completely devour all the tops, leaving only petioles.
Naturally, damaged plants are not able to recover quickly, the yield is reduced several times. Gardeners are trying to find ways to control the pest. Processing potatoes before planting from the Colorado potato beetle is an effective method. Today, you can pick up the appropriate drugs to protect the tubers from the pest.
The influence of the Colorado potato beetle on productivity
As early as the end of the 4th century, unknown beetles damaged potato plantations in the fields of Nebraska. After XNUMX years, the mass of beetles increased significantly, they were able to get to the state of Colorado. Here the damage was significant. After this, the beetle began to be called the Colorado beetle.
Beetles and their offspring are voracious. Adult beetles damage the tubers themselves. The object of food is not only potatoes, but also eggplants, tomatoes, sweet peppers, physalis, dereza, henbane. Do not refuse some flowers, which also belong to the nightshade family. The most voracious in the family are the larvae.
During the entire vegetative period, pests have to be dealt with by various means. But it is possible to secure seedlings at the very beginning of the vegetative period, if the tubers are specially treated with preparations from the Colorado potato beetle.
Adults hibernate in the soil at a depth of 30 to 50 cm. They do not shun tubers either. There were times when an insect was found when peeling potatoes.
Ways to protect
The task of vegetable growers is to protect potato plantings from the invasion of the Colorado potato beetle. The processing of tubers should be done before planting. There are professional (the use of chemicals) and folk methods of protection. Let’s try to figure them out.
Professional protection
Processing potatoes before planting from the Colorado potato beetle involves the use of pesticides. There are drugs of foreign production, they were used until recently. Today, the chemical industry has produced many high-quality drugs that are not inferior in their properties to foreign analogues. Their quality can be judged by the numerous reviews of vegetable growers.
What means of protecting potatoes from the Colorado potato beetle can be used:
- Prestige – reliable landing protection. To prepare a solution for processing potatoes, 50 ml of the product is diluted in three liters of water.
Gardeners, as a rule, prepare about 50 kg of potatoes for planting. The resulting solution is sufficient. Plants will receive reliable protection.
- Maksim most often used in conjunction with Prestige. Not only tubers are treated with Maxim, but they also pickle the soil, where insects can winter.
- Cruiser operates effectively. Not only protects the tubers from the Colorado potato beetle, but also prevents the spread of viral diseases. Landings are protected for a month and a half.
- find saves not only from the Colorado potato beetle, but also from all pests (especially the larvae of the click beetle) that live in the soil. Processed tubers are under reliable protection for at least one and a half months. Precipitation does not reduce the effect of the drug.
Video about the treatment of tubers before planting with chemicals:
accident prevention
Any means for dressing the soil and potato tubers are toxic. Therefore, compliance with safety precautions when working with any chemicals must be observed unquestioningly:
- It is necessary to protect all exposed parts of the body: put on a jacket, gloves, cover your face with a scarf or mask. If dressing needs to be done before leaving the site, this is done in a ventilated area, for example, on a balcony if you live in the city. It is easier for the villagers: they take the planting material out into the street. Work is carried out in calm weather.
- Before working with preparations for spring processing of potato tubers, you need to carefully study the instructions. Prepare the solution, taking into account the dosage.
Processing rules
Processing of potato tubers is carried out immediately before planting. A tarp or a large piece of cellophane is spread on the ground. So that it does not fly away, the edges are pressed down.
- Potatoes ready for planting with green sprouts, slowly, so as not to damage the planting material, are laid out according to varieties in one layer on the litter. In order to correctly calculate the amount of pesticide, the tubers must be hung before germination. If there are few potatoes, you can use plastic fruit boxes, having previously laid cellophane.
- The drug cannot be stored, so it is prepared for a one-time dressing of tubers. It is necessary to breed, taking into account the dosage.
- Before starting the processing of tubers, all assistants must be removed at a distance. The person who will perform the dressing pours the prepared solution into the sprayer. The work is done slowly so as not to miss a single tuber, otherwise part of the potato will be defenseless against the Colorado potato beetle and its larvae. When the tubers dry out, you can start planting.
If there is no sprayer, then the tubers can simply be dipped into the solution. Used for “bathing” potatoes mesh. They are immersed in a pesticide not for 2-3 seconds (no more!). To dry the tubers, they can be laid out on a tarp. This method of dressing is only suitable for a small amount of planting material.
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Drying usually takes up to three hours. If the processing was carried out outside the garden, then the planting material must be packed in two layers of film or tarpaulin so that the pesticides do not have time to evaporate.
Methods tested for centuries
The Colorado potato beetle was brought to Our Country with potatoes at the beginning of the XNUMXth century. Among birds, there are no lovers of poisonous red larvae and striped beetles. It is for this reason that the insect feels safe. People had to come up with means to protect potatoes from the gluttonous Colorado potato beetle and save the potato crop.
Although folk methods are not as effective as chemical preparations, they are harmless. Yes, and there were no pesticides in ancient times.
So, let’s begin:
- Every house had stove ash. It was collected and used as fertilizer in vegetable gardens. Inquisitive gardeners have found that the solution helps save potatoes. The composition was diluted in proportion: 1 part of ash and 10 parts of water. The tubers were dipped into the ash liquid before planting.
- Potassium permanganate is used by all gardeners and vegetable growers. In a ten-liter bucket, pour water to the top and pour 1 gram of potassium permanganate. A saturated pink solution is obtained. Seed potatoes are “bathed” in it.
- For a 10-liter bucket of water, take 15 grams of boric acid. The tubers are dipped into the solution.
- You can pickle the tubers from the Colorado potato beetle with the help of copper sulfate. Per liter jar – 1 gram of the substance.
Done, what’s next…
The protection of potatoes from the Colorado potato beetle in various ways saves plants at first, about a month and a half. Not a single pest eats a pickled tuber; at first, poison also remains in the leaves.
But what to do when the protection stops, and the years of the Colorado potato beetle will be in full swing? Landings can be treated with the same preparations.
How to scare away the Colorado potato beetle from planting potatoes using birch tar in the gardener’s video:
