A Community and Forum For Aquaponic Gardeners

How Often Do You Spray?

In the last 2 months we had an outbreak on thrips that killed everything in our aquaponics. So we sprayed some spinosad and pulled out the plants and started over and then we had an outbreak of spidermites that are in the process of killing everything.

When it comes to spraying regimens. I am spraying worm tea and EM1 on my plants but how often do you guys spray your plants?

Or do you have some other sort of way to deal with pests?

Please remember I'm in an apartment so I can't introduce other bugs to eat the bad bugs.

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Permalink Reply by Gary Lanning on February 28, 2014 at 10:42am

We also have had a spider mite problem in our greenhouse, especially on our tomatoes. I called Michigan State University and they recommended washing each leaf with a sponge using a weak solution of Ivory dish washing detergent. We did this 2 weeks ago and have not seen any mites return yet. We may have to repeat at some time. Ivory was recommended because it doesn't dry the plant leaves out like some other brands do. We also had thrips on our watercress which are growing in a rain gutter stream. I simply lifted the plants out, dunked them in a bucket of Ivory solution, rinsed and replaced in the stream. They are now doing fine. Hope this helps.

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Permalink Reply by Alex Veidel on March 2, 2014 at 8:15am

R.K., you absolutely can introduce good bugs into your apartment. The trick is to be selective with which ones to use. There are quite a few good varieties that are pretty much invisible. You'll never notice them unless you're looking.

Predatory mites are great for spider mite and thrip control (These pretty much need to be seen with a microscope or good magnifying glass. They're not microscopic, but they are REALLY small.) I'm finding predatory midges are wonderful for aphids. They're small than the size of your average fruitfly, hang around your growbed where things are moist so they can lay their eggs, and the larva are ravenous aphid destroying machines.

But I also realize IPM can be expensive (especially since you live in Hawaii, I have no idea what shipping costs are like there).