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Beneficial Insects: Warding Off Pests and Pollinating Your Yard

No garden is free of pests. Fortunately, you can take back your garden! The use of beneficial insects has become a great solution to reduce the use of pesticides in the garden.

First, try to identify the problem:

  • Identify the host plant (the one that’s infected and that you’ve found the damage on).
  • Look at the damage. Is the damage a sign or symptom? A sign is a part of the bug left behind, such as an egg case or part of the bug. A symptom is a bite mark. Perhaps an insect has chomped off the edges from the leaves of your plant.
  • Where did the damage occur? On the high or low areas of the plant?
  • Once you’ve answered these questions, you can go to a reference and identify the harmful insect.
  • It’s not always easy to tell what’s causing the issue. You can always bring in a fresh sample to English Gardens, and our experts will be able to tell you and offer solutions. 

Here are a few common problems and insects to control them:


Here is a selection of insects that English Gardens offers that keep your garden healthy:

Ladybugs

  • Eat aphids, mealy bugs, scale, leaf hoppers and other destructive pests.
  • Both the adult beetle and the larvae will feed on pests that are not too hard shelled, too fast moving or too large.
  • Lady beetles may fly away soon after release. This can be prevented by evening releases. This gives them a chance to settle down overnight.

Nematodes

  • Nematodes can be used to control a wide range of insects that attack plants in concealed environments, such as root zones, tree galleries, thatch of lawns, bark cracks, crowns of plants and corn tassels. Some of the insect pests that are infected and killed by these nematodes are carpenter worms, some immature stages of fruit flies, larval codling moths, some beetle larvae, cabbage root maggots, cutworms, wireworms, pecan weevil larvae and weevil larvae.
  • Nematodes are effective against grubs and the larval or grub stage of Japanese Beetles, Northern Masked Chafer, European Chafer, Rose Chafer, Fly larvae, Oriental Beetles, June Beetles, Flea beetles, Bill-bugs, Cut-worms, Army worms, Black Vine Weevils, Strawberry Root Weevils, Fungus Gnats, Sciarid larvae, Sod Web-worms, Girdler, Citrus Weevils, Maggots and other Dip-tera, Mole Crickets, Iris Borer, Root Maggot, Cabbage Root Maggot, and Carrot Weevils.
  • Beneficial Nematodes are microscopic and live below the soil surface and like a moist environment.
  • Nematodes do not harm worms, birds or plants. They seek out and eat grub larva, remaining effective up to 2 years.

Praying Mantis

  • A Praying Mantis will eat a wide variety of insects: Beetles, grubs, caterpillars, aphids, and grasshoppers – almost anything that moves.
  • The Praying Mantis will attack just about any insect on its path. The Praying Mantis will only complete one life cycle per season. One egg case will yield about 50 to 400 adults (the average is 200). Unless you can find the small mantis, it is almost impossible to tell if the egg cases have actually hatched.

Mason Bee

  • Female mason bees emerge in early spring and immediately begin to forage for pollen and nectar, which they collect from fruit trees, berries, flowers and vegetables.
  • They pack this food into the far end of their nesting cavity until they decide there’s enough there to feed a young bee. Then she lays an egg and seals up the cell. This process continues until the bee has filled the entire chamber with a series of pollen/nectar/egg cells.
  • Mason bees are very effective pollinators. Just two or three females can pollinate a mature apple tree! 

Leafcutter Bee

  • The leafcutter bee is a productive pollinator for summer gardens and flowers. The female carries pollen on the underside of her hairy abdomen, and then scrapes the pollen off within her nesting hole.
  • Because the pollen is carried dry on her hair, it falls off easily as she moves among blossoms. This results in significantly more pollinated flowers than her cousin, the honey bee, who wets the pollen so it sticks to the legs during transport to the hive.
  • These hardworking creatures will fly up to two miles from their hive to find nectar and can carry almost half their weight in pollen. To protect bees and other pollinators, reduce the use of insecticides in your garden.

Mason and Leafcutter Bee Houses are available for purchase, as well as a certificate to have the bees shipped to your home. We offer the BeeWorks Cabin, which is a complete kit that features a cedar cabin house, reusable wood trays, complete accessories and mason and leafcutter bees.


Kids are often intrigued and excited about bugs; getting them involved may be a great way of getting them off the computer and into the fresh air. Make sure to visit our events page to learn more about our upcoming Pollinator Giveaway weekend, which includes a ladybug giveaway and free in-store seminars. Watch our video to learn more.

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English Garden Nurseries & Garden Centers Serve the Greater Clinton Twp., Dearborn Heights, Royal Oak, West Bloomfield, Eastpointe, and Plymouth Ann Arbor Michigan Areas

Providing garden centers complete with full service landscaping, seasonal holiday stores including their enchanting Christmas Stores, and most locations even offer a full service in house florist

English Gardens Detroit MI area nurseries & garden centers are not only the areas largest garden nurseries, but they offer the largest selection of products and services found anywhere in the Clinton Twp., Dearborn Heights, Royal Oak, West Bloomfield, Eastpointe, and Plymouth Ann Arbor Michigan regions providing full service garden centers, full service landscaping and landscape design, seasonal holiday stores including their enchanting Christmas Stores, the largest selection of Patio Furniture in Michigan, and most locations even offer a full service in house florist for flower arrangements for every day as well as those special occasions such as wedding flowers, event flowers, sympathy and funeral flower arrangements, prom flowers, and more!

Our nurseries and garden centers have the areas largest selection of plants, flowers, shrubs, annuals, perennials, and patio furniture. Garden supplies are in abundance, with everything from garden tools and accessories, to garden and potting soil, mulches, bagged garden stone, pots and so much more. We have everything you need for your outdoor gardening needs.

Landscaping? Count on the professional landscape contractors and designers at English Gardens to Make Your Property Beautiful! We offer both DIY landscaping assistance and full service landscape design and construction with our in house landscaping company.

Our floral designers can create perfect floral arrangements for weddings, events, funerals, proms and the like. Make the moment beautiful.

Our Christmas Stores in addition to being one of the areas best holiday experiences, are filled with live and life-like artificial Christmas trees, including flocked artificial Christmas trees, and those sometimes hard to come by 9 foot flocked artificial Christmas trees, as well as a large, ready to take home inventory, of 3 foot artificial Christmas trees, 4 foot artificial Christmas trees, 5 foot artificial Christmas trees, 7.5 foot artificial Christmas trees, 9 foot artificial Christmas trees and 12 foot artificial Christmas trees, and all of the other holiday items you need like Christmas lights, decorations, Christmas wreaths & garland of all types, and unique gifts. Make the Holiday beautiful!

English Gardens store by store offerings in the Clinton Twp., Dearborn Heights, Royal Oak, West Bloomfield, Eastpointe, and Plymouth Ann Arbor Michigan areas;

Clinton Twp. Garden Centers:

Dearborn Heights Garden Center:

Royal Oak Garden Center:

West Bloomfield Garden Center:

Eastpointe Garden Center:

Plymouth Ann Arbor Garden Center:

Be sure to visit any one of our Garden Centers for the largest selection of products and services the area has to offer. If you have any questions please call one of our stores directly in Clinton Twp., Dearborn Heights, Royal Oak, West Bloomfield, Eastpointe, and Plymouth Ann Arbor Michigan for friendly, prompt help.

Clinton Township, MI

Address
44850 Garfield Rd. at Hall Rd.
Clinton Twp., Michigan 48038

Phone Numbers
Phone: (586) 286-6100
Fax: (586) 286-0033

Dearborn Heights, MI

Address
22650 Ford Rd. at Outer Dr.
Dearborn Heights, Michigan 48127

Phone Numbers
Nursery: (313) 278-4433
Florist: (313) 565-8133
Fax: (313) 278-0459

Eastpointe, MI

Address
22501 Kelly Rd. at Nine Mile Rd.
Eastpointe, Michigan

Phone Numbers
Phone: (586) 771-4200
Fax: (586) 771-4894

Plymouth/Ann Arbor, MI

Address
9900 Ann Arbor Road W.
Plymouth, Michigan

Phone Numbers
Phone: (734) 453-5500

Royal Oak, MI

Address
4901 Coolidge Hwy,
Royal Oak, Michigan

Phone Numbers
Phone: (248) 280-9500
Fax: (248) 280-2688

West Bloomfield, MI

Address
6370 Orchard Lake Rd. at Maple
West Bloomfield Township, Michigan

Phone Numbers
Phone: (248) 851-7506
Fax: (248) 539-4738

Patio Furniture from English Gardens of Michigan

Patio Lounge Chairs
Patio Furniture Showrooms
Bistro Sets
Outdoor Dining Sets
Outdoor Sectionals

Make Life Beautiful! Come to English Gardens Today!

Don’t forget to come visit our enchanted Christmas Stores! We have by far the areas largest display of pre-lit and unlit Christmas trees, both Live and Artificial Life-Like Christmas trees in all sizes and varieties, the areas largest selection of Christmas lights in a variety of lengths, sizes, bulb types including energy efficient, and long lasting ,state of the art, LED Christmas lights, Christmas Garland, Christmas wreaths, Christmas decorations, and that perfect gift for that special someone!

Make Christmas Beautiful! Come to English Gardens This Christmas, It’s Fun For The Whole Family!

When it comes to the holidays other than Christmas, you won’t be disappointed, From July 4th, to Labor Day, Columbus Day, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Easter, Mothers and Fathers Day and more, you guessed it, you can count on English Gardens to Make the Holiday Beautiful!

Make the Holidays Beautiful! Come to English Gardens!

At the end of the day, we all enjoy putting a smile on our, and other’s faces, come to English Gardens at any one of our convenient locations and Make Today Beautiful!

Make Today Beautiful! Come to English Gardens!

Christmas at English Gardens

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