You usually discover them when digging up the earth: the centipedes. In the garden they feed on dead plant remains and are therefore useful soil dwellers. If you have placed houseplants on the terrace over the summer months, the agile animals can also settle in the flower pot.
How to remove centipedes in flower pot?
To remove centipedes in flower pots, you can put the pot under water, use insect spray, set up sticky traps or use natural biocides such as diatomaceous earth. Dry potting soil and low humidity in the room help preventatively.
What are centipedes?
These are about 4 cm long, thin reptiles that are striking due to their large number of legs (up to 190). There are around 50 species of agile predators in Germany. They eat soft-skinned animals, which they kill with poison from the first pair of legs, and plant remains. Centipedes live in soft, moist soil and rarely enter the soil of houseplants.
Centipede as an uninvited guest in the flower pot
Many houseplants are grateful when they are allowed to stand on the balcony or terrace in the warm summer months. However, it can then happen that various pests settle in the potting soil unnoticed, including centipedes. As soon as the agile reptile is spotted, countermeasures must be taken. Although the centipedes are useful animals in the garden (they eat old plant residues), they eat house plants in the house and harm them.
Measures against centipedes in flower pots
Various measures are more or less successful:
Put the flower pot under water in the bathtub
- Advantage: Centipedes come out of their hiding places and can be collected
- Disadvantage: not every houseplant can tolerate such a bath
Insect spray from the discount store
- Advantage: nuisances are killed
- Disadvantage: The potting soil and the entire surrounding area are poisoned in the short term. This can cause allergies in humans
cause, the poison also kills all useful animals in the soil.
Set up sticky traps between the flower pots
- Advantage: a scent reliably attracts the animals, they stick and die
- Disadvantage: large specimens escape from the traps
Use of natural biocides, for example diatomaceous earth (powdered shells of fossil diatoms)
Advantage: no harmful effect on humans or animals, the consistency of the powder kills the centipedes
Prevent centipedes
Centipedes don't like drought. So keep the potting soil of your houseplants relatively dry and only water when the top layer of soil has dried out. If the humidity in the room is too high, a dehumidifier can help. Small packets of silica on the windowsill remove any moisture from the environment.
