This time of year, grasshoppers are almost literally everywhere.  They get into your garden, your house, your car, and more.  Mostly, they get into your garden.  Right when you’re work to grow great, organic food is finally paying off: grasshoppers show up to ruin it.

You can spray, of course, but then your garden is no longer really organic.  Earlier, we talked about soap as a remedy for organic insect control and that certainly will work on grasshoppers—to some extent.  It’s not the perfect solution, however, and you hardly have the time to spend all day walking around your garden spraying soap on grasshoppers.

So what to do?

Luckily, there are easy, almost effort-free ways to control grasshoppers in your garden.  All you need is a little knowledge about how grasshoppers operate and what kind of habitat and food they prefer.  Then you just make sure they don’t have that where you don’t want them and do have it where you do want them to go.

Grasshoppers prefer dense, mixed plants made up mostly of grasses and medium-leaved plants (like most natural weeds).  Grasshoppers hatch from eggs that have been secured just under the surface of the soil and by early summer, they are everywhere.  At this early stage, though, grasshoppers are not overly active in their traveling and are extremely susceptible to predators like spiders, ground beetles, and so forth.

As they grow, their predators change and by mid to late fall, they are the food of choice for birds, frogs, large spiders, cats, etc.  In some parts of the world, humans too eat grasshoppers and they are considered something of a delicacy.

In times past, people would send children out to run through the garden “picking grasshoppers.”  This passtime was great for the kids, since it required a lot of energy and good hand-eye coordination.  The trouble is, it’s only marginally effective.  With those compound eyes, grasshoppers can see you well before you’ve spotted them and they are lightning quick.  Still, this is a fun solution to the problem, even if it’s only temporary.

• Knowing what the grasshoppers prefer, though, will tell you what to do to control them best.  Allow some tall grass to grow as a “hedge” near or around your garden.  Grasshoppers will naturally migrate to that area, especially if your garden is well weeded.

• Providing bird perches around your garden encourages flying predators to rest and watch for grasshopper meals to appear.  When you see cobwebs in your garden or near its perimeter, do your best not to disturb them and let the spiders further bring down the grasshopper population.

• If you have ducks and chickens and temporary fencing to keep them out of the garden itself, you can also use these birds to clear grasshoppers.

• Finally, row covers of cloth or screening are popular in the south west for keeping the hordes of grasshoppers off garden plants.  This solution is time and labor intensive, but worth it in those areas where no other option is really feasable—even spraying chemicals doesn’t work in some locations.

Speaking of chemicals, a natural insecticide targeting grasshoppers almost exclusively is made from the nosema locustae fungus, named for its locust-killing properties.  The sprays made from this fungus, usually labeled “Nolo Bait” or “Semaspore,” weaken and kill grasshoppers naturally and do not harm earthworms and most beneficial insects in the bargain.  It effects all locust-type bugs like crickets, grasshoppers, and (of course) locusts.

Most of these remedies are naturally-occurring and require little work to use.  If you begin next year’s garden with grasshoppers in mind from Day 1, all you’ll need to do is plan to have your grass border and encourage birds and predators as your garden progresses.

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