Last August, Mr. Le Quang Toai (59 years old, residing in Dang village, Tho Dien commune, Vu Quang district, Ha Tinh) was suggested and instructed by a plant protection officer on how to raise weaver ants to kill pests and insects in his orange garden instead of using pesticides.
At first, Mr. Toai was quite surprised, thinking this was impossible. Then, he studied and researched attentively.
Old farmer "fights poison with poison" to protect his specialty fruit garden (Video: Duong Nguyen).
Mr. Toai raises ants on orange branches in the garden (Photo: Duong Nguyen).
"At that time, I thought that if we could successfully use ants to control pests without using pesticides, that would be great. Because this method could protect the environment, health and save costs for growers," he recalled.
After the training period, Mr. Toai started to implement the plan by going to the local cajuput forest to look for ants. When he found the yellow ant nests high up, Mr. Toai cut the branch containing the ant nest, covered it with a cloth bag and brought it back to release it on the orange tree in the garden.
Mr. Toai said that over the past 2 months, the method of raising ants instead of pesticides has brought unexpected results (Photo: Duong Nguyen).
When first released, to help the ants "settle down", he used plastic bottles containing dried shrimp and cold rice, tied to tree branches so the ants would have food to feed and grow their nests. This farmer also used white fishing line to stretch between trees to create a path for the yellow ants to find food.
From here, the ant colony reproduces, grows, and finds new nests on other trees. Over the past 2 months, Mr. Toai's 2-hectare orange garden has nearly 40 ant colonies with tens of thousands of ants.
Yellow ants kill insects such as stink bugs, aphids, worms, mealybugs, stink ants and spiders.
"Initially, I found this method effective, the plants grew well and were not damaged. Previously, we had to spend nearly tens of millions of dong each year to buy pesticides and also had to take care of them," Mr. Toai said happily.
The old farmer used a rope to "bridge" between one tree and another for ants to hunt for insects (Photo: Duong Nguyen).
Thanks to dozens of yellow ant colonies, Mr. Toai's family's 2 hectares of oranges on the forest hill are protected and growing well (Photo: Duong Nguyen).
In addition to raising weaver ants, the garden owner also uses non-woven fabric bags to protect each orange that is about to be harvested.
Mr. Toai has been farming in a hilly forest area more than 1km from his house since 2015 with an area of 3ha, of which 2ha is planted with tangerines and oranges. At this time, many orange trees have been harvested.
"From now until Tet, we will finish harvesting. This year, the orange crop is good, with an output of about 15-20 tons, we estimate to earn 200-300 million VND," Mr. Toai calculated.
In addition to Mr. Toai's family, three other households in the area are also using the "fight poison with poison" method, raising weaver ants as natural enemies to kill pests instead of pesticides.
The model of raising weaver ants on citrus fruit trees is being implemented in many households in Vu Quang district (Photo: Duong Nguyen).
Recently, the above model has been guided and implemented by the Plant Protection Center of Region IV (Plant Protection Department) in coordination with the Center for Application of Science and Technology and Plant Protection of Vu Quang district in Tho Dien, Quang Tho and Duc Lien communes on an area of more than 10 hectares of citrus fruit gardens of households.
According to Mr. Phan Anh Toan, an officer of the Center for Science and Technology Application and Plant Protection of Vu Quang district, after more than 2 months of implementation, the model has shown its effectiveness, the weaver ants have controlled harmful insects and pests.
This is a smart biological solution to replace pesticides and protect the environment, creating healthy organic production habits, helping to develop sustainable green agriculture.
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