In order to be able to enjoy delicious cherries from your own garden year after year, you sometimes have to treat the cherry tree with insecticides. Their use should always be carefully considered, as this disrupts the ecological balance.
When should you spray a cherry tree?
Spraying a cherry tree may be necessary to control pests such as the cherry fruit fly or aphids. However, care and caution should be exercised in order not to harm beneficial insects and to maintain the ecological balance.
Since humans have been growing crops, they have had to struggle with pests and diseases. They attack leaves, young shoots or fruits, making them inedible, inhibiting the growth of the tree or destroying entire harvests. Unfortunately, the fight not only destroys the pests but also beneficial insects.
The toxic substances that attack the pests leave their mark on the fruits and have an impact on people, animals and plants in the area. Therefore, caution and caution are required and appropriate when using sprays.
Chemical control
In a home garden, spraying cherry trees is mainly done to combat the cherry fruit fly. This lays its eggs in the ripening fruits, from which white maggots later develop. There is sometimes no other way to deal with aphid infestations than by timely spraying.
Spraying plant protection products to prevent or combat fungal diseases does not play a major role for a hobby gardener. These measures are used on larger areas in commercial fruit cultivation. In principle, in order for the spraying measures to be effective, the entire tree population should be covered.
The mechanical combat
A preventive measure against pests and diseases is mechanical control, which consists in removing infected plant parts, removing fruit mummies, caterpillar nests, eggs of butterflies, mosses and lichens as well as attaching traps and catching devices, such as yellow plates (5, 00€ at Amazon), glue rings or safety belts.
Biological control
Biological control means the protection and promotion of beneficial insects that, as natural enemies, can contribute to the destruction of pests. These are animals, birds and insects that destroy the eggs, caterpillars, pupae, larvae and the pests themselves, thereby eradicating them or reducing the population.
Tips & Tricks
The nettle manure smells – as the name suggests – quite strong, especially in the hot summer days. If you plan to use these on your patio, warn your neighbors.
