Dyna-Gro packages cold-pressed neem oil. In a 1 quart spritzer bottle, mix: 1 pint very hot water 1 teaspoon neem oil (cold-pressed or virgin oil only - Dyna-Gro packages a very good product) 4 drops Murphy's oil soap (or dishsoap) Shake well and add 1 pint of 70% isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol. Spritz Shake frequently while spritzing. Be sure to cover the entire plant. Don't spray in full sun. A little more Murphy's is ok, but unnecessary if using the isopropyl. Repeat at 1-2 week intervals as needed. Copy paste to your browser: http://homeharvest.com/insectspraysneembased.htm Al

Sitting here going thru old pond posts and ran across this one. Wondering if you ever came up with a plan for your Florida pond. I live in IL but have a vacation home in south Florida on the Gulf side. The house was purchased pre=foreclosure in 2007 for use as a vacation home. Like your house, it was a mess, covered in weeds and filled with junk. It also has a pond in the backyard that was icky. One of the first things we did after closing was drain the pond so we knew what was living in it. It's not a big pond - about 12' x 6' oval shaped and 24" at deepest point and also made of concrete painted sky blue. Lots of leaves, pine needles and tadpoles plus a few mosquito fish which I scooped out and saved. After refilling I put in a pond pump and the tads and fish. We were there for 4 weeks that time before we returned to IL. The pump was removed from the pond before we left FL. Next time we went down, put the pump back in and netted out what debris was in there but water was back to icky. What I did was find water hyacinth plants - can import them to FL and they are not sold in the stores near me. So I found a local guy who had some in his pond. He gave me about 12 large plants for free since he had an overabundance in his pond and was tossing them in his burn pile. It's been over 2 years since I added the hyacinths and pond remains clear even without the pump going. Only filtration is the hyacinths. Pond life is abundant. Neighbor tells me she can hear the toads at night. We only go down to the house a few times a year so when we put the pump with a bubble spray in while we're there, it's only for the sound of the water bubbling. Hyacinths are all over Florida in ponds, swamps, creeks, etc. If you're willing to harvest some yourself, you can get them for free. I would get emough to cover 1/4 of the surface because they will multiply like crazy. When we visit our house, the whole surface is covered so we have to pull out at least half of them and burn them. Hope that helps.

Put out some bird feeders and try to attract some of the smaller birds. They will only get 25% or less of their diet from the feeders and they like to eat wasps and many other bugs. Not a perfect solution, but will surely help out and keep them on their toes.

SOOO not organic, however, glyphosate will do the trick. That's the active ingredient in Round-Up. The problem with Round-Up isn't what you might think. The problem is that it has a detergent in it, designed to make it "thinner", (less surface tension, a surfactant), and the detergent is poisonous to plants and animals. The glyphosate just stops the photosynthesis cycle- which your fish and turtles are not reliant on. Look up something called Fusillade II (fluazifop-P-butyl), Eraser-AQ (glyphosate), and then a non-detergent type of surfactant like Dyne-Amic.