Garden Pest Protection: What are Crap Trops and How do they Help?

Ever heard of plants that sacrifice themselves to save your prized veggies? It's not science fiction; it's what happens when you employ a valuable gardening technique called trap cropping.

A trap crop, or sacrificial crop, serves as a decoy. It draws pests away from the plants you want to enjoy and harvest. 

Planting trap crops is a great form of natural pest control. It reduces the need for chemical pesticides, and it’s safe for pets, wildlife, and beneficial insects. Not only that, but it’s economical. In most cases, growing a few extra plants will cost you less money than buying and applying commercial pesticides. 

How it works

When you create a trap crop, the key is to select plants that naturally attract pests like aphids, beetles, or caterpillars so they’ll nibble on those plants instead of the fresh veggies and herbs you want to keep for yourself.

Once the pests are attracted to the trap crop, they congregate there, making it easier for you to remove them, usually by removing or pruning the trap crop plants.

Trap crop methods

There’s more than one way to approach trap cropping, and each has its own benefits. Here’s a look at the most common methods.

• Strip intercropping: With this method, you’d plant trap crops in wide strips within your main crop field. The strips provide a large physical barrier that pests would have to cross to reach your main crops. And by disrupting pest movement, the strips could help reduce the overall pest population in your garden area.

• Border cropping: You would plant trap crops around the perimeter of your main crop. The border would serve as your first line of defense against pests, and it might attract beneficial insects that like to eat the pests you’re trying to keep off your veggies.

• Row intercropping: In this case, you’d plant trap crops in alternating rows with your main crops. Row intercropping provides continuous pest diversion throughout your garden, and it can improve soil health and biodiversity by increasing plant variety and promoting beneficial insect habitats.

• Relay planting: This approach involves planting trap crops at different times relative to your main crops. Ideally, the trap crops would be at their most attractive stage when pests are most active. An example would be planting early-season trap crops like sunflowers before planting your main crop of tomatoes.

• Patch intercropping: You would plant trap crops in small patches throughout your garden. This approach also creates microhabitats for the beneficial interests that gather to eat the pests dining on your trap crop.

Ideal plant choices

As far as what your trap crops should include, that depends on what your main crops will be and the types of pests you want to lure away from them.

If you’re growing cucumbers and zucchini in your main crop, for example, plant Blue Hubbard squash in your trap crop to entice cucumber beetles, squash vine borers, and squash bugs.

More examples include:

• Main crop, beans and tomatoes; trap crop, marigolds; target pests, nematodes and certain beetles including the Mexican bean beetle and cucumber beetle

• Main crop, bell pepper; trap crop, hot cherry pepper; target pest, pepper maggot

• Main crop, cabbage; trap crop, Chinese cabbage, mustard radish; target pests, cabbage webworm, flea hopper, mustard aphid.

• Main crops, cabbage, tomatoes, and peppers; trap crop, Indian mustard; target pest, cabbage heat caterpillar

• Main crop, cabbage; trap crop, nasturtium; target pests, aphids, flea beetle, cucumber beetle, squash vine borer

• Main crop, cabbage family; trap crop, radish; target pests, flea beetle and root maggot

• Main crop, carrot; trap crop, medick; target pest, carrot rust fly

• Main crop, corn; trap crop, beans or other legumes; target pests, leafhopper, leaf beetles, stalk borer, fall armyworm

• Main crop, corn; trap crop, Napier grass; target pest, stemborer

• Main crop, corn, cowpea, millet, sorghum; trap crop, tick clover; target pests, stem borer stria

• Main crop, potato; trap crop, tansy; target pest, Colorado potato beetle

Increasing your odds of success

Trap crops are effective, but they will require a bit of additional effort on your end. For one thing, you’ll need to keep your trap crops healthy so they can do their job: enticing pests to eat them. That means your trap crops will need proper sun exposure, regular waterings, and fertilizer.

You’ll also need to monitor your trap crops regularly. Once you see pests concentrated on them, remove or prune the invested plants, or the pests will reproduce and move on to your main crop.

It’s important to understand that trap crops work best as part of a comprehensive pest control program. So, combine them with other strategies like planting flowers that attract beneficial insects and including some plants that repel pests in your garden. If you feel like you need pesticides to help keep your pests in check, consider organic options.