Holding the plant to support the stem, hose them off with a garden hose. This will kill most of the aphids. Follow up by repeating for a couple of days to make sure you've taken care of them all.
Ladybugs rely on aphids as a food source. They can be purchased from garden center or insect supply company. If you want to attract more ladybugs to your garden try growing plants that produce pollen or nectar such as dill, queen anne's lace or fennel.
Insecticide soap is also an effective way to rid your plants of aphids. Available at most garden centers. Read the instructions carefully before using.
Snails
Create snail friendly traps, such as upside down plant pots. Snails like to hide in dark, cool places. Place a few slices of potato under it to attract the snails. Do not place near where you are growing your fruits, flowers or vegetables. In the morning lift up and pot and dispose of the snails in a bucket of soapy water.
Placing containers filled with beer around your garden will attract snails. They will crawl in the container and drown.
Mix a solution of 1 part espresso and 10 parts water and spray on your plants. Caffeine is toxic to snails. Reapply after a rain.
Cutworms
Pour cornmeal around your plants, cutworms love to eat cornmeal, but they can not digest it, so they die.
Diatomaceous earth (DE) may also sprinkled around your plants. Diatomaceous earth is made of microscopic skeletons and shells of tiny marine organisms. DE kills by scraping and scratching the waxy body covering of the insects when they crawl through it and they die of dehydration.
Create barriers around the stalks of your plants with a paper or cardboard collar. This will prevent the cutworms from getting to the plant stem.
Yellow Jackets
Yellow jackets tend to build their nest underground. After a nest is discovered, fill a large watering can with 1 gallon water and 1/4 cup liquid dish detergent. Pour the mixture into the ground where the nest is located early in the morning while they are still in the nest. The water and soap will drown the wasps.
Fire Ants
Pour a solution of 1/2 gallon boiling water and a squirt of dishwashing liquid into the ant hill. Do not do this near vegetation you want to keep.
Mosquitoes
Mosquitoes like to lay their eggs in standing water, so get rid of any water that has accumulated in anything in your yard such as empty flower pots, children's toys, etc. A good practice if you have a bird bath is to change the water every day.
Many mosquitoes use vision to locate their next victim. Dark clothes are natural attractions.
Avoid wearing perfume and other fragrances such as scented sunscreen or hair products.
Black Ants
Putting tomato leaves on an ant hill will repel the ants.
To keep ants off trees block their path by wrapping the tree trunks with two-sided tape.
Pour boiling water and dish detergent on the same as fire ants.
Place a bowl of cream of wheat somewhere where the ants can access it. They will eat it and explode.
Talcum or baby powder sprinkled on the ants seems to work as well.
Spray surfaces where ants have been seen with 50-50 mixture of vinegar and water several times a day. Vinegar has a natural chemical which alters the ants scent and which ants avoid.
Cinnamon, cloves, cayenne or black pepper can also be placed where the ants are entering to deter them.
Earwigs
Just before dark place a cat food or tuna can filled with a 1/2 inch of tuna fish oil or cooking oil with a little bit of bacon fat added in a damp place of your garden. In the morning dump the earwigs into a bucket of soapy water to kill. Repeat until you don't catch any.
Mix a solution of cheap dish detergent and water in a spray bottle and apply anywhere you have seen the earwigs. Spraying around window wells and anywhere that is dark and damp is a good idea.
Keeping Dogs Out of Garbage
Sprinkling some ammonia on the contents of your garbage cans should prevent stray dogs from getting in to them.
Repelling Rabbits/Flea Beetles
Powdering your plants with a cheap brand of talcum powder works like a charm in repelling flea beetles and rabbits on tomatoes, potatoes, peppers and other plants. When the rain washes it away, apply more.
Fruit Flies
In a small jar pour in 1/2 inch of apple cider vinegar and a couple of drops of dish detergent. Cover with plastic wrap and puncture some holes in the wrap with a fork or toothpick.
Fleas
Try bathing your pet with a small amount of Dawn dish detergent.
