What Do Pill Bugs Eat?
These creepy crawlies eat mostly debris, so they are quite good for gardens and natural settings.
They are omnivorous and eat leaf litter, grass clippings, dead plants, dead insects, dead animals, fallen fruit, and other organic matter.
They also eat stink bug eggs off the leaves of plants. This is a very helpful trait!
They very rarely eat young plants’ roots, stems, and leaves.
When sow bugs and roly-poly bugs eat organic matter, it passes through their digestive systems and is excreted.
This process increases the rate of decomposition in compost piles and helps reduce organic litter and debris in natural settings. It also helps enrich the soil.
These creatures are very important at toxic sites, such as slag heaps and coal spoils because they are able to ingest heavy metals like cadmium, lead, zinc and copper.
Once they have taken these pollutants in, they become crystallized as spherical deposits in the midgut of the bug.
Pill bug on wood surface.Pin
Photo Credit: Instagram @abiwright27
This process works to remove toxic metal ions from soil.
Because sow bugs and pill bugs are so tolerant of these contaminants, large numbers are able to thrive in ravaged settings.
Their presence helps stabilize soil so vegetation can become reestablished and help these contaminated settings recover.
The quick growth of vegetation over toxic sites helps to reduce metal ions leached into groundwater.
The presence of vegetation also assists in settling the toxic dust.
Can Pillbugs Be A Problem?
In a balanced, established setting, pill bugs will just hide during the day and amble about at night eating organic matter without bothering anyone.
In fact, they are a very important part of a healthy garden ecosystem and are generally valuable helpers in cleaning up garden waste.
In an unbalanced garden environment, pill bugs could be a problem.
For example, if you use chemicals and pesticides that kill off natural pill bug predators, you are likely to have a roly-poly population explosion.
If you clean up all the organic matter around your yard and don’t leave anything for the pill bugs to eat, they are likely to go for your tender plants, seedlings, and flowers.
If you have just acquired an unbalanced garden setting, you may have some pill bug problems for a while.
How To Deal With Unwanted Pill Bugs?
The wisest way to deal with any imbalance in your garden is to strive to establish balance.
For example, adding natural predators to your garden tends to keep populations of other garden dwellers under control.
Natural predators that help reduce pill bug numbers include:
Predatory nematodes
Centipedes
Spiders
Toads
Frogs
Birds
Ants
Roly poly bugs may also eat one another occasionally.
If you are lacking a good natural balance in your garden or in an unbalanced setting (such as a greenhouse), sow bugs and pill bugs may nibble on roots, stems, and leaves that are touching the soil.
When this happens, follow the advice in the video above. You may also find that a little diatomaceous earth scattered around the affected plants will work to deter them.
What If You Have A Large Population Of Pill Bugs Or An Invasion?
Problem pill bugs are unlikely, but in very extreme situations, you may wish to try some of these solutions.
A pill bug crawls on a textured surface.Pin
Photo Credit: Instagram @no_rain0709
Natural Sprays
Sprays made with essential oils are effective against a number of different types of undesirable garden dwellers. Some of the most frequently used essential oils include:
Pennyroyal
Peppermint
Eucalyptus
Cinnamon
Citronella
Rosemary
Oregano
Tea tree
Citrus
These can be added to a Natural Neem oil for plants spray or an insecticide soap solution at a rate of about a dozen drops per quart. This solution can be used to spray undesirables directly.
Other natural insecticidal sprays can be made using ingredients such as:
Garlic oil
Chili pepper oil
Cayenne pepper sauce
Mix these substances (alone) with water at a rate of one tablespoonful per quart of water.
Be careful with the peppery ingredients, they can irritate skin, eyes and nasal passages.
Trap Or Bait Pill Bugs, Sow Bugs, Slugs & Snails
Make pill bug traps by putting whiskey, apple cider vinegar, apple cider or beer in shallow dishes around the garden at dusk.
You will also catch slugs and snails with this method.
There are also commercially available insecticidal baits designed specifically to kill pill bugs.
Most of these pest control products are made using iron phosphate, spinosad spray, metaldehyde, and/or carbaryl.
These ingredients are also effective against slugs and snails.
How To Keep Pill Bugs Out Of The Garden?
If you don’t want any pill bugs around, you can remove all debris and dry up any damp areas.
However, doing this will limit the types of plants you can grow.
If xeriscaping is your goal, this might be a good idea.
Close-up of a cluster of pill bugs on wood.Pin
Photo Credit: Instagram @natures.exquisite.creatures
However, because pill bugs are so ubiquitous, don’t count on keeping a dry garden to keep them away.
You’ll probably still find roly polies hiding out at the base of your cactus and under stones in the rock garden.
Mulching between rows in your veggie garden with black plastic sheeting may deter them because they will not like the heat beneath the plastic.
However, this technique may have the opposite effect because it may drive pill bugs to seek refuge around the damp, tender stems of your plants.
Taking care to water early in the day so the soil is dry by evening may also discourage them.
But, it may create the opposite effect in that they will seek out moisture where they can find it.
That’s likely to be closer to your plants.
All-in-all, keeping pill bugs out of your garden is really not necessary and not a good idea.
It’s far wiser to take care of establishing a good, natural balance.
Mulching with organic matter and providing an inviting habitat for all manner of garden fauna ultimately results in a thriving, healthy garden.
https://plantcaretoday.com/pill-bugs.html
