Can you drown spider mites?

[matthew ferrell]

Found the little buggers all over my strawberries this morning,  Since I run those in a NFT I thought I pull them out and put them under the water for 1/2  a day.  Anyone have any luck with this before?

[George]

I've sprayed them off with water many, many times.  You must repeat because eggs will hatch in just a few days.

[matthew ferrell]

After a 1/2 day soaking, the plants look like hell and the mites were back this afternoon.  Round two little mites, round two.

[Vlad Jovanovic]

Matthew, if you can isolate your plants from your system water (or protect your tank/system water) from over-spray I can give you a recipe I use and have I've had great success with against those pesky buggers...if you're interested...

[matthew ferrell]

so interested and yes, and yes.  All plants are nft, in plastic cups no media.

[matthew ferrell]

These pest in another life cost me a LOT of money.  In my new life they just cause my strawberries to suck at life.

[Vlad Jovanovic]

Water...3% to 5% oil... 0.5% dish soap...mix and spray. Mites breathe through the skin of their soft bodies and the oil clogs up their breathing 'pores', suffocating them.

 (I've tried essential oil of lavender, I've tried tea tree oil, olive oil, sunflower seed oil...all of them seem to work fine)....

The next day spray with plain water or worm tea if you can make some. After a few (2-3) days spray again with the oil mix if you see more mites (wait til the eggs hatch if you can hold out). Then again with water and so on...Eggs will often hatch like George says so I keep this up for a week or more. It's kinda a hassle, but it gets rid of them for me every time so far.

Don't be tempted to make the oil mixture stronger than 5% (above 7-8% and you will in definitely burn your plants...

[Vlad Jovanovic]

Yeah I hate those fuckers. Because of them 2 or 3 times a week I break out the magnifying glass neurotically spot checking and inspecting the undersides of leaves...I must look like a total lunatic...but those things have caused me a lot of headache as well, in the past. and they are quite prevalent here. I've learned to catch them early on, and fare much better that way.

matthew ferrell said:

These pest in another life cost me a LOT of money.  In my new life they just cause my strawberries to suck at life.

[George]

If you use soap, try Octagon, if you can find it.  It's a bar soap which you can shave off and dissolve in hot water.  It's very effective against spider mites.  Remember that they inhabit the underside of leaves - not an easy place to spray.   It kills by smothering and by changing the PH - why changing the PH kills them I don't remember but I do know that it works.  I haven't used it in aquaponics.  I've had spider mites once in the five months my system has been running and I hit them with a hard spray of water two or three times and they were gone completely.  Good luck.

Vlad Jovanovic said:

Water...3% to 5% oil... 0.5% dish soap...mix and spray.

[matthew ferrell]

Thanks all.  I will destroy them with impunity and joy.

[matthew ferrell]

They are starting to die.  Luckily they colonized my nft system, which is fairly easy to get to the bottom of the leaves.