Can Epson salt take care of cutworms? Let’s find out.
Cutworms are pests known to attack a wide range of plants.
These are larvae of the cutworm moth that are quite common in gardens or lawns. Young plants are the worst-hit when it comes to cutworm feeding activity. One of many ways to fix this problem involves using Epsom salt.
Will Epsom Salt Kill Cutworms?
As the name implies, this is a kind of salt made up of three main constituents’ sulfur, water, and magnesium.
Out of these three ingredients, magnesium tends to be the most significant. This is also known to be beneficial to plants, hence its preferences by many people as a remedy for cutworm issues.
Epsom salts and Pest Control
Epsom salt is a pure mineral compound that’s widely used for many things.
Examples of its uses include helping to remove hair spray, serving as an acne remedy, easing gout discomfort, removing excess oil from hair, de-flake lips, serving as a facial scrub, and helping to ease mosquito bites.
What more? Epsom salt is well known to serve as a general stress reliever for treating bruises and soothing sunburned and itchy skin. While there are several other uses of Epsom salt, one of those we’re more interested in are its pest control properties.
For pest control, Epsom salt is applied to garden pests ranging from slugs, snails, beetles, and cutworms. It’s also used to protect young plants from being damaged by these pests.
While this is true, there are doubts about its efficacy.
Can I Get Rid of Cutworms Using Epsom Salt?
While Epsom salt sounds like a great idea for many gardeners, it has its limits as to how far it can resolve your pest issues. Epsom salt is used as a deterrence to repel cutworms.
To have any real impact, you must sprinkle it around the vulnerable plants to form a barrier.
Cutworms are unable to advance beyond such barriers. That way, your plant stays safe.
However, there are times you might still find these pests on your plants. This makes you wonder how they came about despite applying Epsom salt.
Epsom salt application can also be a challenge, especially when cutworms attack your lawn. It’s practically impossible to form a barrier around each strand of lawn grass.
The practicability of using Epsom salt as an effective remedy for cutworms is greatly limited.
Some research findings have also discovered that Epsom salt isn’t as effective against cutworms as many people think. This extends to a wide range of insects it’s deployed against.
This might be frustrating news for readers who have hoped to use Epsom salt for their pest control needs.
While this might be disappointing, it’s best to look for what works. Since you’re interested in organic treatment approaches for cutworms, it’s necessary to consider other options available to you.
Options may include diatomaceous earth, coffee grounds, eggshells, and baking soda.
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Why Epsom Salt is Thought of as a Remedy or Cutworms
You may wonder why Epsom salt is seen as a remedy for pest issues by many. Like a salt and mineral compound, it’s assumed that Epsom salt will have a dehydrating effect on cutworms.
However, this isn’t entirely the case, as there have been situations where cutworms have survived and thrived even with Epsom salt being applied.
Other Alternatives to Consider
Having pointed out the downsides or inefficacy of using Epsom salt for cutworm control, you may be interested in finding other alternatives. We’ve mentioned diatomaceous earth, coffee grounds, eggshells, and baking soda.
While these may be recognized as likely options for eliminating pests, it’s important to state that even these may not offer comprehensive relief from cutworms.
However, you can increase your success rate by creatively using these natural remedies to solve your pest issues.
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Epsom Salt Vs. Diatomaceous Earth
Diatomaceous earth has long been a reliable ally for exterminating different kinds of pests.
It’s also a great product to consider trying out as an alternative to Epsom salt. This natural powder from ground diatoms helps deteriorate the exoskeletons of a wide range of pests.
While it may look like a fine powder, it actually consists of minute crystalline particles that wear off soft body tissues and exoskeletons of a wide range of pests, including cutworms.
This leads to eventual dehydration.
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Epsom Salt Vs. Coffee Grounds
You can put coffee grounds to good use by applying them to various pest issues. Instead of using Epsom salt, you might want to try experimenting with coffee grounds.
For whatever reason, coffee grounds will deter these cutworms. Sprinkle around affected plants in your garden and observe what it does.
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Epsom Salt Vs. Egg Shells
Like diatomaceous earth, eggshells can keep your plants safe from cutworms.
This only needs to be spread around the area to kick in for its deterrent action. With these shells in place, cutworms find it extremely difficult to reach their target plants.
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Epsom Salts Vs. Baking Soda
Baking soda is another alternative to Epsom salt that’s considered more reliable.
Although it’s not considered a pesticide, baking soda is registered with the EPA for application on several pest issues like powdery mildew and fungi.
It could serve to resolve your pest issues. All you have to do is sprinkle near the base of plants as you would Epsom salts.
Baking soda will deter cutworms from advancing, but it also kills these pests when they come in contact with it. Other plant pests are also repelled by baking soda.
With Epsom Salt, the Result may go Both Ways.
When using Epsom salt for cutworm control, you should know that your outcomes might go.
In other words, It may help in some cases to deter cutworms and may not be useful in other situations. You’ll have to look for more reliable alternatives to try out.
There you go! We’ve discussed quite extensively the use of Epsom salt for cutworm control. It’s important to be open in trying out other options, as presented above.