Mealy bugs - missed a treatment

[Tom Reddick]

Good evening all,

I was doing so well. Very minor outbreak of mealies with just a few Phals a while back. I isolated them in time and did 3 weekly treatments with 3 in 1- thoroughly spraying tops and bottoms of leaves, base of plant etc. I really soaked them good.

After week 3 they were looking great and I got busy, so I stopped. And 2 weeks later a mini-explosion of juveniles.

I sprayed again this weekend- which would normally be the end. But after missing 2 weeks, do I need to start the 4 treatment cycle all over?

 

[eds]

I would. I find them very persistent and hard to eradicate completely.

 

[Ray]

I would consider using a pesticide with a different MOA.

 

[eds]

On this side of the pond your options are very limited without a commercial spraying licence.

 

[TyroneGenade]

My sympathies. My battle with the bugs continues. I hope I have gained the upper hand. I have been using neem oil, spraying the plants monthly regardless of whether I see anything. I haven't seen any meallies now for a while. I had tried another insecticide which was very effective but the little fuzzy bastards just came back. The only down-side with the neem oil is that the orchid roots do not like it and have now lost several orchids to the neem oil -- it was death to the infested Tolumnia, Brassavola and Catt. Psyche. If anyone has a suggestion for a better working insecticide that is safe to use indoors I would love to hear it!

 

[Tom-DE]

Tom, give this product a try and you don't have to spend a bunch....It is a Bayer product--BioAdvanced 3-in-1 Insect Disease and Mite Control (for roses and flowers)
I have used it and no bad side effects on orchids. It is a systemic insect killer and it should continue killing insects including mealies up to 30? days... There is a concentrated form or a ready-to-use one. Lowes or HD will have them.

Edit: Hopefully, it is not the same 3-in-1 product you have been using. It contains Merit...Please follow the instructions on the label when you use it or dispose of it.

 

[tomp]

If repeated treatments don’t work, I sometimes do a clean repot.

 

[Tom Reddick]

Thanks everyone- looks like I am going to do another round.

@Ray if you have specific suggestions- I am all ears. I grow indoors but I do have a safe area outside to apply treatments and allow the plants to dry before bringing them back in.

@Tom-DE - yes, I am using that treatment at present. And fear not- I am using it strictly in accordance with the directions. Part of what makes it such a hassle to apply and why I want to be done lol.

@tomp - that is a really good idea and thank you. As this next round of treatment ends, I will go ahead and repot everything with 1-2 treatments left to go. It is only about a dozen plants and most of them could do with repotting as it is.

A more general observation for fellow indoor growers that really helped me keep this current outbreak very small- I have discovered over time that mealy bugs find it very easy to go down, somewhat easy to go sideways if the distance is a few inches or less to the next plant, and very difficult to go up. So now my isolation space is a bottom shelf in the corner of the room where the floor is the only way down and there is good 12-18 inches going sideways before one encounters other plants. So far it has been 100% successful in containing the menace that originally hit a very specific area that had some new additions in it.

One more hint- check your trays. After this last minor outbreak I checked all the trays with affected plants and I found 3 small bits of the white fluff in the lips under the top edge of trays or along the bottom of the trays. I promptly went through the entire collection and one tray at a time soaked and scrubbed all the growing trays in water with dishwasher soap.

PS- For those of you now receiving big sanderianums from me, fear not- these were never impacted. In fact, for reasons unknown mealies don't seem to care for sanderianum- at least in my growing space. I have a number of them scattered around and none of them- from compot to NBS- has ever had a single mealy.

 

[Ray]

@Tom Reddick My go-to "big gun" is acephate, an organophosphate, but azadirachtin (Azamax) is a good alternative, as is Botaniguard, if you want to go the non-chemical route using living microbes.

 

[BrucherT]

gonna say yea to starting over and following through. Your conditions apparently favor the pests. Guessing everyone has brought these home; I get a lot of plants from Hausermann’s and they’re just rife in there (sorry, Hausermann’s, you know I love ya). When I find them in my house, I do 8 full weeks of treatment on the affected plants and those adjacent and inspection on everybody. I use soap mix and alcohol; Safari is my big gun but I try not to use it unless absolutely necessary.

 

[southernbelle]

My sympathies. My battle with the bugs continues. I hope I have gained the upper hand. I have been using neem oil, spraying the plants monthly regardless of whether I see anything. I haven't seen any meallies now for a while. I had tried another insecticide which was very effective but the little fuzzy bastards just came back. The only down-side with the neem oil is that the orchid roots do not like it and have now lost several orchids to the neem oil -- it was death to the infested Tolumnia, Brassavola and Catt. Psyche. If anyone has a suggestion for a better working insecticide that is safe to use indoors I would love to hear it!

I would remove any you see with alcohol on a Qtip then use Bonide imadicloprid granules sprinkled on top of the mix or Safari granules same way. Got rid of persistent scale that way. Both are systemic. Dampen the mix then sprinkle on. Lightly water in. Then when you water next you release more, etc. it treats for about a month. Didn’t have to repeat. But if you do switch to the other one.

 

[Justin]

Use the big guns. Enstar 2 + Decathlon.

 

[juliana]

I hung one yellow sticky trap on each of my shelves on my rack. Catches a little flying bugs you never knew you had, and male mealybugs. I think it might cut down on the population a bit.