Tips on controlling Leatherjackets

There are a few lawn pests that will eat away at your grass roots thus destroying a lawn and one of them is Leatherjackets - the larvae of the Daddy Long Legs or Crane Fly to be technically correct.

We have passed the time of the year when the adults are flying around and being batted by the Cat but their work as adults is now done! They have laid their numerous eggs in your nice green sward and soon they will be hatching into hungry larvae ready to start attacking your nice new grass roots now and in the spring time. Never ever underestimate the damage that a troop of Leatherjacket larvae can inflict on a grass area. They will strip a lawn in no time!! 

I recall one rather well to do customer who, following an insect treatment for the same the day before called me up on a Saturday morning shreaking down the phone in a blind panic. Her lawn was 'alive' with crawling larvae and she had taken the time to heed my verbal advice to measure out one square metre from which she had collected over 200 larvae from this small area! By the time I got round to her house, I was met with a jam jar full of the dark grey/brown larvae that were starting to smell a bit!

At another site, similiar to many that I visit, I viewed a 250 sqm lawn stripped bare by the larvae in the springtime. You can control Leatherjacket larvae now, between the months of October and end of March with a product based on Chlorpyrifos. It will sit in the the soil for up to three or so months and then 'grab' the new larvae as they hatch, thus ending the problem there and then. There is no point renovating a lawn with turf or seed until you have solved the problem as even if you re turf the lawn, if the insect larvae are still in the soil active, they will simply eat the new grass roots that the new turf will develop and hey presto - no lawn!

Contact your local Lawn Treatment Company to assist you in the eradication of the larvae, before they get too active and hungry.

One product that you can self apply as amateur lawn owners is Bayer Provado, which also kills Chafer Beetle Larvae - so two larvae with one stone so to speak.  Kill them when they are young or regret it!

Read more about Controlling Leatherjacket Larvae in your Lawn

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