>How can I get rid of earwigs. They are eating all of my basil. >I've heard that you should "trap" them, but how?
Earwigs are mostly beneficial. They are omnivorous and eat
plant material, other animals, and damaged or decaying organic
material. When they go after healthy plant material, it is usually
limited to tender seedlings. They just look so fierce! They tend
to get blamed for damage caused by other critters.
"Common-Sense Pest Control" by Olkowski & Olkowski says,
"Earwigs are easy to trap. In the home garden, containers such
as tuna-fish cans that hold 1/2 inch (13 mm) of vegetable oil or
moistened bread crumbs can serve as traps without any poison.
Because of the earwigs' predilection for crawling into small spaces,
bamboo tubes or rolled-up newspapers are also good traps. The
traps, baited or not, should be placed on the soil near plants
just before dark and checked with a flashlight 12 hours later or
in the morning. Shaking the trapped insects into a pail of soapy
water drowns them."