What Is Integrated Pest Management (IPM)?
This topic has the potential to be interesting… if you’re into bug-on-bug action. If that’s too much to handle, then kick rocks in flip-flops
A Little Context
This is a holistic approach to pest management. IPM is a strategy of pest control that emphasizes a multi-faceted approach. Many of these approaches stem from an understanding that pests, as well as everything on the planet, are part of a grander ecological web and therefore organisms can be recruited to take care of the pests for you! How neat!
To prove this point, look at this ladybug eat aphids. It is gnarly.
Furthermore, using non-chemical controls is prioritized over using chemical controls, such as pesticides. Chemical controls aren’t totally excluded (vinegar and hydrogen peroxide are very safe and widely used), but others are considered “the nuclear option.” This is because they can be too effective and their consequences can be severe, far-reaching and indiscriminate. So, instead of only using chemical pesticides (which is unfortunately a popular approach in commercial agriculture), IPM aims to use a suite of controls, such as bio-controls, mechanical and cultural controls …and if all else fails, then use of chemical controls, but only in a very limited and targeted capacity.
Something else about IPM is the understanding that is impossible to completely get rid of pests and it is more practical to just manage them. In fact, it can even be preferable to have some pests because they’ll instigate a response from plants that makes them hardier or more anti-oxidant rich.
However, with regards to houseplants, it is possible to implement these controls in a way that will significantly reduce the risk of pests ever even appearing.
How did I learn about these practices?
To some, I could see how this seems like a very obscure and niche topic of study. It certainly was for me, at least. I was first introduced to the concept in college in my environmental ecology class. Then my first job out of college, I had the opportunity to implement IPM practices on a large scale while working for a commercial greenhouse cultivation company, as well as in projects on outdoor fields.
- For example, we significantly reduced the need for chemicals sprays by introducing parasitic wasps. Don’t worry, they don’t lay eggs in your brain. They particularly prefer to plant their pupa eggs into live aphids. After the pupa gestate a wee bit, they then explode out of the aphid body to go on and lay more eggs in other aphids. Pretty neat, right?!
- To prevent mold and soil fungus, because greenhouses tend to be very humid, we used concoctions of beneficial microbes to crowd them out.
- We used hydrogen peroxide to clean pots, surfaces, seeds, etc… because it only releases water and oxygen as byproducts while eliminating mold spores and harmful bacteria. We even watered with hydrogen peroxide because it provided oxygen to waterlogged roots and killed any eggs that pests might leave in the soil.
- …And we kept things impeccably clean. Cleaning regularly certainly goes a long way in preventing pest outbreaks.
Over time, I adapted these practices for humble collections of potted plants. These practices, and the other ones I’ll mention, are meant to be preventative but can be implemented even if you are currently battling pests.
I don’t want to bring more bugs in my house to eat the pests!
That’s pretty reasonable. Some of these practices don’t translate well into the indoor houseplant environment. Bringing in more insects to eat pests on a houseplant would just make more of a mess. However, it is an example of a biological pest control. So fortunately, if you don’t want to use insects as a type of pest control there are other types to employ.
So what are these types of pest controls?
Before describing categories of pest controls it is important to know how to diagnose plant symptoms. The two categories of symptoms are abiotic (symptoms that stem from environmental factors) and biotic (symptoms that stem from other organisms i.e. bacteria, fungi, weeds, insects, animals). Being able to make a good diagnosis comes with experience and learning.
As mentioned earlier, IPM emphasizes using a diverse suite of controls. These controls are categorized as such:
- Mechanical & Cultural — these include pruning, scratching the soil, diatomaceous earth, sticky traps, rat traps, removing pests by hand, fences, regular cleaning, biodynamic farming, succession planting, crop rotations (that’s not everything)
- Biological — this includes beneficial microbes, chickens (if closely managed), predatory/parasitic insects (like ladybugs and parasitic wasps), myco-insecticides, companion planting, and more
- Chemical — less toxic examples include vinegar, hydrogen peroxide, chemical fertilizers, essential oils; more toxic examples include Raid, Round-Up, Sevin, Orthene, and the list goes on.
This brings us to the steps of putting IPM into practice. They’re pretty simple with only five steps:
- identifying and monitoring diseases and pests
- monitoring the environment
- deciding the proper IPM intervention
- implementing the intervention
- post-intervention reassessment
These come from the book, Hemp Diseases and Pests: Management and Biological Control by J.M. McPartland et al.
IPM is nothing special or new
In all reality, nothing about IPM is new. It’s just taking knowledge from several fields of study and applying that to reduce crop damage, or in our case reduce houseplant damage. Anyway, the following disciplines contribute to the practice of IPM:
- common sense
- agriculture
- ecology
- your grandma’s gardening skills from the mother country
- plant physiology
- entomology
- mycology
- chemistry
- technology
Final Comments
While IPM was developed to be applied to large scale agriculture, many practices can be used at any level of scale, from large scale commercial agriculture to a single potted houseplant.
Hope you found something useful. Thanks for reading. Please enjoy my favorite quote from Voltaire
