Proper lawn care and locking up your food can limit common pests.

Jane Purnell • September 8, 2022 • Advertising Disclosure

Editor's Note: This story originally appeared on LawnStarter.

Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is a long-term, eco-friendly approach to preventing pests in the home and garden with as little pesticide as possible.

While pesticides can help exterminate severe pest infestations, they’re often a short-term Band-Aid solution for an underlying problem. They also dent your wallet and can harm people, wildlife, and the environment.

Integrated Pest Management is a less harmful alternative in which homeowners practice regular yard maintenance and cleaning to make their homes and gardens unattractive to pests in the first place. While it might sound like you need special certification to perform it, anyone can practice IPM around the home. Here are just a few examples of how easy IPM can be:

As you can see, IPM can be pretty low-effort. It just requires thinking ahead. If you’re interested in how to get started with Integrated Pest Management in your home and garden, here’s everything you need to know …

IPM is an approach that focuses on the long-term prevention of pests using various techniques, which we discuss in-depth below.

IPM strategies can be executed in all areas where pests exist, including the lawn, home, and garden. All IPM practices are intended to minimize risks to humans, wildlife, and the environment by limiting pesticide use.

Pesticides are used in an IPM program only when previously established guidelines indicate pesticides are necessary.

Pests are often attracted to an area because of an available food source, water source, or otherwise suitable habitat. If you don’t eliminate these factors from your spaces, pests will keep reinfecting the area. That’s why relying solely on pesticides is only a temporary solution.

Good IPM practices include removing the pest’s food, water, and shelter. But that’s not the only way you can prevent an infestation. Other IPM techniques include:

Whether a pest is invading your lawn or kitchen, chances are good it’s surviving off a delicious snack. Once you identify the pest, research what kind of food it consumes, figure out where it’s getting food in your home or garden, and remove that food source.

Here are some ways you can remove a pest’s food source:

All of the above could be feeding pests such as ants, flies, and roaches. Get rid of their food, and eventually, those pests will die out or move on to a more fruitful feeding ground.

Some pests –– mosquitoes, for example –– need water to rehydrate or lay eggs. Pools of standing water in your yard (puddles, clogged gutters, a pet’s water bowl that stays out 24/7) are sure to attract these pests.

Here are some easy ways you can remove pests’ water sources indoors and outdoors:

Habitat manipulation sounds lofty, but it basically just means changing your environment so that pests don’t like it anymore. Pests gather in habitats that provide their ideal living conditions.

For example, spiders like to take cover in undisturbed areas, such as underneath wood piles or in your basement. Ticks hide in thick vegetation where they can climb high and latch onto passersby, like tall grass.

Once you’ve identified the pests in your lawn, garden, or home, research what kind of environment they like. Then, make your home and garden the opposite. For example, many pests like dark, enclosed places. So, lots of well-lit, open space with nowhere to hide isn’t likely to attract many pests.

Examples of habitat manipulation that can make your space less hospitable to pests include:

Sometimes gophers enter your garden for a quick bite to eat, or mice enter your home through a crack in the foundation. Set up exclusion barriers to exclude (“keep out”) hungry rodents and other critters from certain parts of your home and landscape.

Examples of exclusion barriers include the following:

In many cases, improper maintenance practices create an appealing environment for pests. Overwatering the lawn, cutting the grass too short, and over-fertilizing are examples of how maintenance gone wrong can encourage a pest infestation.

Correcting your maintenance regimen for the home, lawn, or garden can significantly impact a pest population. That means cleaning your house regularly, learning the best way to mow your lawn, and watering your garden just enough, not too much or too little.

Biological control simply means that when pests arrive uninvited, you have a natural enemy there to show them the door. Introduce natural predators, such as ladybugs, dragonflies, or frogs, into your yard to manage populations of bothersome pest insects.

Aside from natural predators, there are microscopic organisms you can add to your soil to deal with lawn pests (often sold online or at local garden shops), such as:

Because biological control requires a healthy population of beneficial insects or other critters, it’s an IPM strategy for outdoor use only.

Mechanical control is any physical or hands-on approach used to control pests. Creating an exclusion barrier, such as a fence, falls into this category.

Here are some other examples of mechanical pest control:

To keep a pest problem under control, remember to check vulnerable areas for signs of pest damage. If you ignore the signs or just don’t notice them in time, a pest problem can become severe enough to need pesticides. Catch the signs of pest damage early, and you can attempt IPM control methods without pesticides.

Different kinds of pests will leave different marks on your surroundings: Ants build hills, and Japanese beetles chew holes in leaves, for example. These are some of the most common signs of pests for you to look out for:

Give your lawn and garden a competitive edge by growing pest-resistant plant varieties. For instance, some grass types are bred to resist specific lawn diseases, and some plants in the landscape are naturally deer-resistant.

Before you begin your IPM program, set an action threshold, which is how large a pest population can grow before you can’t stand it anymore and have to turn to pesticides.

How many pests can you tolerate? One or two bugs in the garden is normal, but how many pests are too many for you to manage? Once an infestation reaches that threshold, you can consider using pesticides (safely, of course).

When mishandled, pesticides can harm human health, wildlife, pets, and the environment.

To remain within the sustainable guidelines of your IPM approach, use as few pesticides as possible. Here are some tips on how to minimize your pesticides’ impact on the environment:

IPM doesn’t offer a quick solution like pesticides, but it does offer long-term protection. It also encourages you to take good care of your home, lawn, and garden (which ultimately boosts your property’s curb appeal).

Is IPM worth the time and effort? Let’s take a look at the pros and cons …

Now that we’ve laid out the pros and cons, let’s answer some common questions about Integrated Pest Management …

Practicing good lawn care is the most effective way to apply Integrated Pest Management strategies to your lawn.

Keeping your yard well-maintained helps remove a pest’s food, water, and shelter. A healthy lawn is less likely to succumb to weeds, insects, and fungal diseases. In other words, the healthier your lawn, the better it will outcompete harmful stressors.

A severe pest outbreak can be a nightmare for your vegetable garden. After all that hard work digging and planting, you don’t want your harvest to suffer from aphids and spider mites.

Here are some valuable ways you can apply Integrated Pest Management to the garden:

No one wants cockroaches and mice running around the kitchen at night. Here are some Integrated Pest Management practices for the home:

Integrated Pest Management isn’t easy. If it were, more people would be ditching convenient pesticides.

But just because IPM is time-consuming and demanding doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy its long-term, eco-friendly benefits. Consider hiring a pest control professional to develop the first steps of your IPM program. Or, if your property is already suffering from an infestation, an expert can get rid of it quickly and safely.

And remember, a poorly maintained yard is a breeding ground for pests. Hire a local lawn care professional to prevent pests by keeping the lawn in tip-top shape, from mowing the grass to aerating the soil.

Disclosure: The information you read here is always objective. However, we sometimes receive compensation when you click links within our stories.

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