Hello, we just bought an acre this year. I want to turn into into a self-sustaining(as much as possible) permaculture food forest type garden but right now we have lots of grass mixed with clover a few trees along the edge of the property and a patch of perviously tilled garden plot of over used unhealthy soil. It needs work. Also we have lots of Japanese beetles. They seems to be leaves most of our plants alone but I haven't weeded at all and they seem to prefer a couple of the weeds. The biggest problem area is back by the natural pond and woods. They did tear up one raspberry plant that wasn't hidden back in the woods. We are thinking about getting chickens which would help by the house but what plants could I toss in by the pond to maybe curb their numbers a bit for when we grow more food? I know they don't like garlic and onion type plants. What flowers could be good?
I also did some pulling of the beetles off our garden plants then tossing dead bodies into the garden because supposedly the beetles don't like the smell of other dead beetles but it didn't seem to do much. There aren't many out there now so I think their season is coming to a close. What could I get to eat/kill the eggs before they hatch next year or the grubs before they become beetles and surface?
Jenavieve
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