Now that my peppers are sprouting away I am turning to my garden beds and could use some advice. Pests, meaning bugs, have decimated almost all of last year's plants, which were healthy and produced a lot of peppers. Since we eat what we grow I am very hesitant to use any kind of pesticide on the plants, but is there something I can do when I turn everything over and add compost to the soil now? Ants, and other bugs are the issue. One good suggestion I received was to electrocute the soil which will make the bugs crawl out so they can be killed, but I'm not sure that would get all of them. Add ant killer to the soil and let it set for a couple of weeks? Either I learn how to control this or I'm going to have to keep all of my plants in pots.

Thanks in advance.