Integrated Pest Management?

I would like to introduce a term being used more and more in the landscape and gardening industry. “IPM” or Integrated Pest Management, is an environmentally sensitive approach to managing pests and relies on a combination of common-sense practices. Its premise is to reduce pesticide use in both the urban landscape and farms. The EPA has these statistics regarding pesticide use on their website at: http://www.epa.gov/greenacres/wildones/handbk/wo8.html

1. A lawnmower pollutes as much in one hour as does driving a car for 20 miles.
2. 30-60 percent of urban fresh water is used for watering lawns (depending on city)
3. 67,000,000 pounds of synthetic pesticides are used on U.S. Lawns
4. 580,000,000 gallons of gasoline are used for lawnmowers
5. And speaking of gas, the EPA claims that 17 million gallons of fuel, mostly gasoline, are spilled each year while refueling lawn equipment. That's more than all the oil spilled by the Exxon Valdez, in the Gulf of Alaska.
6. $25,000,000,000 is spent for the lawn care industry
7. $700,000,000 is spent for pesticides for U.S. Lawns
8. 20,000,000 acres are planted in residential lawns
9. Gas-powered garden-tool emissions account for an estimated 5% of the nation's air pollution

Additionally, according to the National Academy of Sciences, lawn use is a significant component of the total pesticide problem. The NAS says that although the farmer uses pesticides more widely, the homeowner uses 10 time more per acre than do farmers.

I found these eye-openers at beyondpesticides.org.

1. 78,000 million households in the U.S. use home and garden pesticides.
2. Herbicides account for the highest usage of pesticides in the home and garden sector with over 90 million pounds applied to lawn and gardens per year.
3. Of the 30 commonly used lawn pesticides: 16 are toxic to birds, 24 are toxic to fish and aquatic organisms, 11 are deadly to bees; and 17 are detected in ground water.

The following practices can all be considered part of Integrated Pest Management and are all part of the common-sense approach to reducing the use of pesticides.

1. Hand Weeding
2. Proper Diagnosis
3. Mulching
4. Releasing beneficial insects and provide them with breeding habitat
5. Provide bird nesting sites by plantings and by properly placed birdhouses
6. Biodiversity is the key and supports a wide variety of beneficial insects and birds that will patrol landscapes and gardens for insect pests all day, every day.
7. Plant shade trees; use native, pest & disease resistant, drought tolerant plant varieties.