Seven Ways to Discourage Mosquito Breeding in Your Garden

September 19, 2019 (Updated February 15, 2020). By Oscar Ortega: Mosquitos adore the heat of late summer in LA, but their garden party starts as soon as water reconstitutes their dried eggs, and they are more than happy to bring that party inside when it suits them.
 
While mosquito parties once meant merely inconvenience and itchiness, mosquitos new to LA present new health dangers to us. Invasive mosquito bites now carry the potential to bring serious diseases, including the Zica and West Nile Viruses, St. Louis encephalitis, Dengue fever, Chikungunya, and Canine Heartworm.
 
Prevention is essential. Once mosquito eggs exist, they can persevere through less ideal conditions. The eggs of the new-to-LA Aedes Mosquito, for example, can sit dormant in dry conditions for at least a year. Once water is reintroduced the eggs are “reconstituted” and hatch.
 
 

 
 
There are seven ways we can all pitch in to make our gardens less appealing to the worst mosquitos. Most involve consistent monitoring and maintenance.

Maintain

You and your maintenance team can do quite a bit to make your garden a less hospitable vacation spot and hatchery. There are a few easy starting points:

1. Limit watering: Most people water too much, even for turf lawns and high-water plants. Dialing it back improves garden health even as it prevents the standing water that inspires mosquito breeding.
2. Clear waterways: Litter can easily clog waterways. Regular inspection of dry rivers, rain gardens, gutters, etc. ensures water isn’t trapped or standing. This will also enhance slope stability and prevent other stormwater-related issues.
3. Clean/Empty saucers: Even an ounce of water in a container garden saucer can attract mosquitos. Watch these collection points, empty, scrub and dry them.
4. Close rain barrel taps:  Once your barrel is empty, scrub it out, actively dry it, close the barrel tap, and inspect the screen’s integrity. An “empty” rain barrel may still have enough moisture to call to mosquitos! An open tap or tiny gap in the screen will allow mosquitos to enter and lay eggs in the bottom of the barrel. The eggs will patiently wait for the water they need to grow.

 
If you are completing these tasks yourself, here is a useful tool for remembering key steps:
 

 

Renovate

Beyond maintenance, there are also a few renovations that can make your garden less likely to attract mosquitos. They include:

1. Smart Irrigation: Because it delivers water directly to plant roots, smart irrigation reduces the opportunity for standing water. It is also the best way to support native foliage.
2. Native Plants: While no known plant wards off mosquitos, native plants need less water and do well on subsurface drip irrigation.
3. Permeable Hardscapes: Walks, drives and patios of permeable materials allow water to seep into the ground. This may help reduce standing water, particularly after stormwater events.

Report

Know our Vector Control District. If there are areas in your community beyond your garden that appear to be mosquito breeding grounds, please take the time to report them.

• Greater Los Angeles Vector Control
• LA County Department of Public Health
• Los Angeles County West Vector and Vector-Borne Disease Control
• Pasadena Public Health Department, Environmental Health and Vector Control
• San Gabriel Valley Mosquito and Vector Control District
• Compton Creek Mosquito Abatement District
• Antelope Valley Mosquito Control District

Three Simple Steps Can Protect Your Health, Your Garden and LA

May 2021. By Oscar Ortega: What is a pest? You and I may immediately think of aphids and thrips. Pesticides, insecticides and herbicides, on the other hand, may see you, me, our pets, kids, and monarch butterflies as pretty pesky too!

An abundance of research connects the thirty most commonly used pesticides with dramatic harms including birth defects, cancer, endocrine issues, kidney and liver effects, neurotoxicity, and reproductive issues. Not to mention pesky allergies and skin sensitivity! These harms can occur when they are applied correctly and not tracked indoors. More often than not, however, those applying these chemicals to home gardens do not wear adequate protection, and these chemicals easily find their way into homes and waterways.

Ready for the good news? These toxic chemicals simply are not necessary to supporting plant vitality – or even to getting rid of garden pests. We take three steps to keep any garden beautiful and pesticide free:

• Water Less: Most homeowners, and many gardeners, over water lawns and flower beds. Particularly when sprinklers apply “overhead” water, the resulting rot will attract pests, as will any standing or pooling moisture.
• Watch More: Many infestations occur due to poorly timed or executed pruning. Trees and shrubs do their best at withstanding pests attracted to the wounds when temperatures are cool. When prunes match the desired structure of foliage, fewer and less frequent cuts are needed. This further minimizes the opportunity for infestation.
• Apply Patience: When we see aphids, we know a garden will soon fill with ladybugs, attracted to their preferred feast. Sometimes leaning into this future delight requires a little deprograming. Chemical companies spend a great deal to ensure our disgust in some pests is great enough to inspire immediate action. We trust the cycle of life enough not to let their marketing get to us!

A little patience can go along way. These three strategies will help even poorly maintained, traditionally landscaped spaces adapt to life without toxic chemicals. That said, because planting the right plant in the right place with adequate space goes a long way toward ensuring that plant’s long term happiness, it is much easier to maintain smartly designed and installed native gardens. In fact, effective, healthy landscape maintenance does not look (or feel) all that different from enjoying a garden!

All this patience adds up! Each year, FormLA Landscaping keeps more than 2400 lbs of these toxic chemicals from our watershed. While we do it to protect you and ourselves, we are pretty proud our expert horticultural care also saves LA!

More Information

• Maintenance | Tips: Be Good to Your Heart
• Beyond Pesticides: Health Effects of 30 Common Pesticides
• Bob Villa: 8 Reasons Not to Use Pesticides
• Country Living: 10 Most Toxic Items at the Garden Center
• Earth Easy: How Toxic Are Lawn Care Chemicals