After my last gardening column about earwigs, I got a few calls from people wanting to know how to get rid of them. I went looking in my books and on the Internet and I found a few tips which may help some of you. Don’t give up if it doesn’t work the first night.
Take a small water bottle, cut the top one-third off or so, fill the bottle with tuna or tuna cat food, invert the top part that you cut off with the spout facing down and reattach it to the bottle. The earwigs can crawl in, and are attracted by the smell of food, but won’t be able to get out again. It seems like an easy, non-toxic method that’s worth a try.
Beer traps! You dig a shallow depression in the soil for a small saucer so that the edge of the saucer is level with the soil surface. Pour in about 1/2 inch beer. Change nightly. Fresh beer seems to catch more than old beer.
This one uses tuna cans filled with 25 per cent soya sauce to 75 per cent water in the “tuna” can. This one works great according to many comments. You only need a small amount in the bottom of the can, maybe 1/2 inch. Keep the unused portion in the fridge.
Another is pieces of hose, about two feet long. Make sure the inside is wet — if it’s dry, you won’t get as many. Next morning just take a bucket of soapy water and knock the pieces of hose against it and they will fall into the soapy water. Just check the roadside for people throwing out old hoses on garbage day if you don’t have an old one. (This one I have used with success.)
Simply take an old newspaper and roll it up loosely, securing it with a rubber band. Soak the newspaper completely in water, but not too much to make it fall apart. Plant the newspaper where you have observed earwigs. Leave overnight. Earwigs will have made their home in a newspaper and when they do, put the newspapers (now with the earwigs in them) in a plastic bag, sealing the bag tightly. Throw it in the garbage bin. Whatever you do, do not use it for compost. You can also shake it over the soapy water bucket.
Slug dough recipe which also work for earwigs: 1 Tbsp. molasses, 3 Tbsp. cornmeal, 1/2 cup flour, 1/2 cup water and 1/2 Tbsp. yeast. Let it foam up for a few hours, then put it out in tuna cans, about 1/2 inch per can, in the garden.
Use 1/2 inch of used vegetable oil Leave the can where earwigs have been observed but where it cannot be accidentally kicked over. You can even put a slice of apple inside to make the trap look more attractive to earwigs. Leave overnight, and the next day, you will see that earwigs have made their way into the can and drowned
Earwigs hate bay leaves. Sprinkle them around your home.
I have earwig traps, which are little round containers with a bottom and a top with three small holes on the top for them to crawl in. To bait them, you half fill with water, add 1 Tbsp. of vegetable oil, five drops of liquid dish soap and one of the following: three drops fish lure attractant, three drops of cod liver oil, a small piece of fruit.
The next gardening column will be written by Gail Morgan of BX Creek Daylilies.
For more information, call 250-558-4556.
Jocelyne Sewell is The Morning Star’s gardening columnist, appearing every other Wednesday.
