Strawberries are a favorite berry of adults and children. It ripens early on the plantation and has a sweet and aromatic taste. However, in order to get a high-quality harvest, it is necessary to take a number of protective and preventive measures in the spring to protect it from diseases and pests.

Consider how to treat strawberries in the spring from diseases and pests and in what time frame. For protection, chemical and folk remedies are used.

Protection of plants from pests

Spring is the time when not only plants wake up, but also their pests.

Strawberry

Weevil

The elephant, or weevil, is a small insect, 3 mm long, black in color, with a slight bluish tint. For its long proboscis it received the name weevil.

In early spring, when the air temperature rises to + 13 ° C, weevils wake up and begin their activity. In the same period, young strawberry leaves begin to grow. The bugs first feed on young leaves of strawberries, and when May comes, they move to the buds, gnawing unripe anthers.

After about a month and a half, the female makes a hole in the side of the bud and lays an egg there. After that, she gnaws the peduncle, and the infected bud eventually falls to the ground. In total, the female lays up to 50 eggs per season.

Weevil

A week later, a larva appears, which feeds on the contents of the buds. The weevil pupa develops within 7-9 days, also feeding on the contents of the bud. Young bugs appear in the second half of July.

If you do not fight this insect, you can lose up to 90% of the entire crop. How can strawberries be processed to protect them from pests?

Weevil control

It is possible to reveal the defeat of the plantation by the weevil by the peduncles cut off, as if with a knife.

Attention! The bug attacks strawberries, strawberries and blackberries, so do not place them next to each other.

As mechanical measures in spring, collection, removal from the plantation and burning of fallen buds, as well as shaking off bugs from the bushes onto the fabric spread below, are used. It is better to shake off early in the morning when the activity of the weevils is minimal.

How to handle strawberries if the plantation is heavily infested.

To combat the pest, spraying with chemicals is used:

  • Fufanon;
  • Kemiphos;
  • Alatar;
  • Novaktion.

When using them, it is important to fulfill the condition: in the spring, processing of strawberries should be carried out before blooming flowers or after fruiting.

Thus, the first treatment is carried out 5-6 days before the blooming of the buds. Summer has come to the middle - it's time for the second treatment.

Fufanon

How can blooming strawberries be treated against pests? Strawberry processing can be carried out with biological preparations:

  • Akarin;
  • Fitoverm;
  • Spark Bio et al.

You can also purchase Sesame, which includes spores of a fungus that infects a pest.

Homemade liquid made from dry mustard is also used for protection. For it, the following proportion is used: 100 g of mustard per 3 liters of water. You need to sprinkle the bushes with this composition.

Note! The weevil does not tolerate the smell of some plants, for example, garlic, tansy, marigolds, nasturtium, etc. Therefore, it makes sense to plant garlic near strawberries. You can also insist garlic, tansy or wormwood and pour this infusion over the beds.

Another popular rescuer is ammonia or ammonia. In addition to the weevil, its solution will rid the plantation of ants, aphids, nematodes and the May beetle. Ammonia is very useful for plants, not only as a protection. For strawberries, this is a good nitrogen supplement.

Urea will help in the fight against weevils on strawberry plantations. For this, the bushes are watered with a solution of the drug (30 g per 10 l of water) in early spring.

Urea

Slug

Appears on the plantation during the period when the fruiting of the bushes begins. The slug resembles a snail, only without the shell. They feed on tender leaves and berries. Wherever they crawled, a specific shiny trail remains.

They prefer shaded, humid places, so they feel great under leaves on an irrigated strawberry plantation. In addition to strawberries, they feed on fallen fruits and vegetables, food waste, etc.

Attention! Slugs not only spoil the berries, but they are also carriers of helminths - worms that infect people and animals.

Slug fighting

Usually, chemical preparations are not used to destroy the pest, since in this case the processing of strawberries will be carried out on a ripe berry. Therefore, folk remedies are used to fight.

Traps are used to catch slugs. To do this, beer is poured into the cans at the bottom and buried in the aisles, or wet rags are laid out, into which slugs crawl during the day. Further pests are collected by hand or destroyed along with rags.

Since the skin of slugs is delicate, it is recommended to mulch the soil with sawdust, pollinate the plantings with wood ash as protective measures. You can scatter mustard powder around the perimeter of the plantation. Salt is fatal to the skin of slugs, therefore, saline solutions are used to combat.

Slug

What else can you spray on strawberries? To scare off pests, you can treat the plantation with a 0.1% coffee solution. To do this, dissolve a double dose of instant coffee in a cup of water. You can pour the coffee grounds under the strawberry bushes. This will also work as blackfoot protection.

Whitefly

Another dangerous pest that infects strawberry bushes is the small whitefly butterfly. Its size does not exceed 3 mm.

It feeds on plant sap, which is why the bushes affected by the colony of insects are oppressed, stunted and may even die.

In addition, in the process of vital activity, the butterfly secretes a whitish liquid (honeydew), which covers the affected strawberry leaf. This liquid is a glossy, sticky substance that is a breeding ground for the sooty fungus. You can determine the disease by the black spots that cover the leaf.

Whitefly

The largest population of the pest is observed during the warm and humid summer. If greenhouses are not equipped with adequate ventilation, they are also potential breeding grounds for whiteflies. Up to 15 generations of an insect appear in them per year.

The butterfly's lifespan is only about 1 month, but during this time it lays about 130 eggs. Of these, after a week, larvae appear, which also live and feed on the underside of a strawberry leaf, and after 3-4 weeks young individuals appear.

Note! In the open field, eggs are laid in the spring.

How to kill a whitefly

To combat insects, mechanical methods, chemicals and folk remedies are used.

As chemicals that destroy whitefly use:

  • Aktara;
  • Actellik;
  • Confidor;
  • Rovikurt and others.

Attention! If strawberry blossoms have begun, then chemical preparations cannot be used.

Chemical preparations have no effect on the larvae and eggs, so after a week it is necessary to re-process the plants.

From biological means, the placement of macrofus or encarsia bugs on the plantation has proven itself well.These insects are natural enemies of the whitefly, as they feed on the eggs and larvae of the butterfly.

Preventive actions

In order not to create comfortable conditions for the development of the whitefly on the plantation, you cannot:

  • plant densely strawberry bushes;
  • spraying in wet weather;
  • leave fallen leaves on the beds in the fall.

Note! It is also necessary to periodically destroy weeds on the plantation.

Strawberry diseases

Powdery mildew

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In addition to pests that infect and destroy berries, strawberry bushes are affected by various diseases. Powdery mildew is one of the most dangerous fungal diseases.

Signs of the disease

The disease can be determined by the following signs:

  • affected leaves rolled up in the form of a tube;
  • diseased leaves are purple and powdery;
  • ripe berries acquire a mushroom smell and taste.

Powdery mildew on strawberries

Treatment methods

Spraying with chemicals is used to treat the disease. What can you spray on strawberries?

If the plants get sick in early spring or after harvest, then fungicides are used to treat strawberries, for example, Topaz.

You can treat the affected plants with a solution into which colloidal sulfur (70 g) or soda ash (50 g) is added to 10 liters of water. Spraying is carried out in the morning or evening.

You can also use copper sulfate and soap for these purposes. Dilute a mixture of 20 g of soap and 20 g of copper sulfate in a bucket of water and spray the diseased plantation.

Important! It is also necessary to constantly remove the affected plant parts.

Gray rot

Also applies to fungal diseases. It is quite common. It affects all parts of the plant except the roots.

Definition of disease

The disease can be determined by the following specific features:

  • leaves become covered with gray spots and begin to rot;
  • the berries are covered with a gray bloom, their tissue softens;
  • fruits lose taste, smell, become watery.

Note! The onset of the disease is facilitated by increased air humidity, sharp fluctuations in daily temperature. In damp and cold weather, strawberries lose their resistance to fungal attack.

Treatment

The following drugs are used to treat diseased bushes:

  • Bordeaux solution (1%) or Topaz fungicide can be used for spraying in early spring or after harvest;
  • Dusting bushes with wood ash;
  • Iodine solution or boric solution. At the same time, boric acid and iodine, in addition to therapeutic functions, also feed damaged plants well.

Late blight

Another dangerous fungal disease is late blight.

Signs of the disease

It is possible to determine the defeat of late blight by the following indicators:

  • the central root cylinder turns red;
  • the leaves turn grayish and take on the shape of a bowl;
  • decrease in fruiting;
  • dying off of roots;
  • sudden wilting and death of the plant.

To combat this disease, the drugs Ridomil, Topaz are used. You can use potassium permanganate to process strawberries.

Late blight

Ridomit should be done early in the morning or in the evening so as not to damage the bushes.

Iodine is also suitable for processing (5 g of solution per bucket of water). Spraying is carried out every 2 weeks.

Prevention of fungal diseases

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To protect plantations, the following rules must be observed:

  • plantings should not be thickened;
  • the beds should be located in dry, sunny, ventilated areas;
  • prevent berries from rotting;
  • periodic weeding;
  • compliance with crop rotation;
  • timely removal and destruction of diseased bushes.

Important! If the strawberries are transferred to another area, then before planting plants on it, you need to treat the infected soil.

How to cultivate the land after a sick strawberry

If the strawberries were infected with fungal diseases, then after transferring the plantation to a new place, it is necessary to cultivate the soil so that other plants do not get sick the next year.

Treatment of honeysuckle in the spring from diseases and pests

Onions, garlic, as well as legumes and cabbage perfectly disinfect the soil.

The site can be cured by planting siderates, for example, mustard, followed by digging in autumn.

To suppress phytopathogens, microorganisms contained in the preparations Baikal EM-1, Baikal EM-5 are used. Tillage is carried out half a month before the onset of frost.

Additional Information! After digging in the fall, fungicides are introduced into the topsoil: Fitosporin, Phytocide, etc.

Thus, timely and correct processing of strawberry bushes will help protect plantings from pests and diseases.