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Do you have a vegetable garden or a decorative one? Do you like growing your own veggies, or maybe you have a passion for flowers and plants? Perhaps you get the same thrill as I do when you spot the first leaves of snowdrops and croci, green and tender, sprouting from the wet brown soil?
Maybe you love seeing your lettuce, basil, celery, and tomatoes grow day by day, eager with expectation and always thinking about the pleasure you will get when you first actually taste them? Well, in any case, you do put a lot of toil and effort into keeping your (vegetable) garden in nick conditions. Bravo!
Let me guess… You like nature, and you would love to avoid chemicals, especially pesticides, as far as possible or at all costs? In the end, what is the point in growing your own food if you then cover it with the same toxic chemicals used for what you buy in supermarkets? On top of that, a garden where pesticides have been used lacks much of its beauty… No butterflies, no bees, no ladybirds, no grasshoppers, and even fewer birds in sight! Yes, but no pests either…
So, one day, while you enjoy watching your saplings and plants grow in the light of the Sun, all of a sudden you notice that your lettuce leaves have holes in them… “Mmm, what could this be?” you think. Then, leafing through some gardening books, you find a tip;
“Wait till it is dark, two hours after sunset or so, and with a torch, go and check who or what is causing this damage to your veggies and flowers.” Fine, you follow the advice and, after you have put your children to bed, you make for the lettuce at the back of the garden… As you inspect the tender leaves, you notice a few, tiny, dark, and quite peculiar insects chewing on them; you look closer and you realize they are earwigs!
“Earwigs, really?” the words come out of your mouth against your will. Yes, didn’t you know that earwigs can infest a garden, or sometimes even just a (flower) bed, and cause quite serious damage? If you did, well done, because not many people know this fact.
If this is what is happening in your garden right now, you may want to consider making your own earwig trap. In fact, although there are products on the market that will kill the little animals, these chemicals are bad for the environment, for the plants themselves, and for you and your children, so, you are much better off (and a few bucks richer) not using them at all.
In this article, we are going to learn how you can make a homemade earwig trap; it is very easy, efficient, and cheap. But before we do that, let’s check out a few facts about earwigs.
A Day in the Life of an Earwig
If you thought that earwigs were a species of insects or a genus, think again! In fact, they are an order of insects, which means that within it there are many families (12 to be exact) and even more species – a whopping 1,800 in fact!
Nevertheless, they may look all similar to the naked or inexperienced eye… As you know, their most distinctive trait is the split tail, from which we derive their names.
To be honest, the title of this section is not wholly correct, as it should have read “a night in the life of an earwig” because they are nocturnal animals that rest during the day and are active at night, which makes them more difficult to spot.
They are found in the Americas, Africa, Europe, Asia, and 60 species even in Australia, where they feed on flowers (especially dahlias), leaves (especially lettuce), and fruit (especially apricots), sometimes causing grave problems to farmers.
When they are born, they look very different from when they reach maturity; in fact, as they hatch from their eggs they tend to be whitish and their tail is not split. In this stage, they are correctly called earwig nymphs. In their lifetime they molt five times; as they do so, shedding their skin and becoming bigger, they develop all the typical features of the insects we have come to know.
Finally, earwigs are famous for their sexual dimorphism, a complex term that means that males and females are very different from each other; in fact, often female earwigs do not even have the classical split tail. Finally, few people know that these insects actually have wings!
Oh, here’s a handy infographic showing the differences between male and female earwigs!
Homemade Earwig Traps – Some Key Facts
We have come to a very important point indeed; you may think that making your own earwig trap would take you time and it would be easier to buy one ready-made…
Well, unfortunately, you can’t. In fact, despite the wide diffusion of these animals and their habit of chewing on the soft leaves of vegetables and on the petals of beautiful flowers, there are no earwig traps on the market!
The second, and maybe most important point is what to do with earwigs once they have fallen into a trap. The only humane thing to do is to release them back into the wild. In the end, these insects are a very important link in the food chain. In fact, they provide food for an incredibly wide range of animals, including:
- Many birds
- Many amphibians
- Many bugs
- Many spiders
- Many invertebrates
- Lizards
- Insectivorous mammals
Can you see how these humble creatures are so important? You have animals of all sorts depending on them…
Ready? Make Your Own Earwig Trap
We have finally come to the key point of this article: how do you make a homemade earwig trap that works and costs little, which is easy to put together and use? Here we go…
To start with, we advise you to use a variety of traps as well as many of them simultaneously. Here are the best:
Rolled Newspaper Earwig Trap
This is possibly the easiest trap you can use; just roll up an old newspaper into a tubular shape. Fix it with some sellotape if necessary to keep it in shape. Place it near the crop affected, under foliage, and in a dark and lightly moist spot overnight.
After eating away at your lettuce or dahlias, the earwigs, as morning comes and they flee from the light of day, will look for a suitable place to rest. They will find that your rolled-up newspaper offers a perfect shelter and a comfortable home.
So, all you will need to do is pick up the earwig trap in the morning and empty the earwigs into a cardboard box with a few leaves of lettuce, close it, pierce a few holes into the lid and keep them there until you are ready to release them back into the wild.
Plastic Pipe Earwig Trap
This is similar to the previous trap, but it is made with an old plastic pipe. To start with, choose one which is dark, not transparent, and about 1 inch or a little more (up to two may do) in diameter. Place it in similar spots as you would put the rolled paper earwig trap, under leaves, and in a moist but warm corner at night.
Then, go to collect your earwigs in the morning and put them in a box with lettuce and breathing holes to keep them till you are ready to let them go into the wild where they belong.
Tin of Tuna Earwig Trap
Used tins of tuna can be used as traps as well. These, however, only work with non-flying earwigs. In fact, while most species have wings, only a few can actually fly.
So, depending on the species you are dealing with, this trap may or may not work (but remember: use a variety of traps!)
They are really easy; just use open tins, like those of tuna, to let the insects in but not out. Simply bury the tins in the ground, so that the earwigs fall in but cannot get out.
Yet again, it is best to place them by the plants affected at night and collect them in the morning to then release the insects back into nature but far from your garden.
Tub of Margarine Earwig Trap
Do you have an empty margarine tub that you do not use? Even that can be turned into a cheap, efficient, and easy-to-make earwig trap. To start with, dig a hole in the ground by the affected plants, in a shady and moist position, possibly under the leaves of the very plants they are feeding on.
This hole should be large enough to accommodate the whole tub, and about an inch less deep than the height of the tub.
Next, take a knife and cut slits into the sides of the margarine tub; these should form horizontal cuts; the best size is about 3 to 4 cm long (1.5 inches) and 1 cm high (1/2 inch). Make sure that they are about 1 cm (1/2 inch) from the top of the tub. Next, place the tub in the hole in the ground at night.
The holes should be at ground level so that the earwigs can get in easily. Fill any empty space left in the hoke around the tub with earth. You should now see only the lid and the part of the sides from the holes up.
Put a stone on top for extra security. Collect the earwigs in the morning; transfer them into a box with breathing holes and some lettuce leaves where you will keep them until you can release them.
To Cut a Long Story Short…
Earwigs are fascinating animals; they are very important to the food chain, providing food to a huge range of small animals, but, unfortunately, they can also be a problem with vegetables, fruit, and flowers.
The best solution is to place earwig traps where they live at night and collect the insects in the morning and, as you can see, it will cost you little or nothing at all. So, ready for it?
