• Kill and prevent Japanese beetles in your garden with tobacco juice.Japanese Beetle image by Jim Mills from Fotolia.com
  
  Japanese beetles are found throughout the United States and are a highly damaging pest in the garden. They spend much of their time underground where they eat away at plant roots and compromise a plant's ability to take in water. They also consume leaves and petals. Nicotine is an effective insecticide and Japanese beetles can be killed and repelled with tobacco juice. Tobacco juice will not harm your plants.
  
  

Direct Attack

• Examine your garden and lawn for places where you find accumulations of beetles. Japanese beetles feed on a wide range of plants but likely spots are near rose bushes, grape vines, hydrangeas, wisterias, rhododendrons, irises, maple trees, birch trees, crab apple trees and purple-leaf plum trees. Simmer 1 to 2 cups of loose pipe or cigarette tobacco in 1 gallon of water until the water turns dark brown. Allow the tobacco juice to cool, strain the leaves and saturate the ground with it in those places where you saw the beetles.
  
  

Bait and Trap

• Gather several empty milk jugs. Add a mixture of 1 cup water, 1/4 cup sugar, 1 mashed banana and 8 ounces of yeast to each jug. Place the milk jugs throughout your garden. The fermentation and sweet odor will attract the Japanese beetles and once inside the jugs, they will not be able to get out. Once the jugs are filled with the beetles, pour in tobacco juice, cap the jug and shake it so that all the beetles become covered and die.
  
  

Repellant

• Keep the Japanese beetles away with a bi-weekly treatment of your garden with tobacco juice spray. Simmer 1 to 2 cups of loose pipe or cigarette tobacco in 1 gallon of water until the water turns dark brown. Allow the tobacco juice to cool and strain the leaves. Mix in one cup of dish soap and one cup of alcohol-based mouthwash. Dish soap works by damaging the waxy coating on beetles and the smell of mouthwash is a deterrent. Dilute with a ratio of 1 part tobacco juice and 20 parts warm water for spraying.