Phylloxera information - aka root mites aka root aphids

[clowntown]

I just had a thought.

I remember reading a while back about how killing mycorhizzae (if you use/have it) can be especially harmful to the plants, since it will leave a lot of root surfaces open (where the mycorhizzae was once attached) and more easily open to infection / attack.

I'm guessing pyrethrins on plants with mycorhizzae is even worse than without.

Any thoughts on that?

...

I'm also curious how many people have this and don't even realize it. I wonder because I found out by accident, and could have easily gone unnoticed for ... who knows.

Damn. I would encourage all of you to ask all of your growing friends to check their medium very carefully. And stare for long periods if necessary, even if they feel stupid doing it!!

What a ing pain in the

...

I'm just now starting week 4 (of 11) and they're starting to frost up. I'd really hate to start over now, the plants look otherwise good above-surface. Except for the damage done by Bug Buster-O. I can totally see what you mean now, Scay Beez by the lower fan leaves falling off after a week. And S4vvy's description of serious lockout on some leaves, yeah.

The last time I peeked at the roots down the sides of the pots, less than a week ago, they looked pretty good. Gotta check tomorrow.

 

[halloweed2006]

They're staring to come back at an alarming rate. I neemed/bug bustered everything again, took nearly 20 hours of intensive labor over this saturday and sunday, and I still have a few more hours of work. Sigh.... The DE didn't really do much except slow the flyers from spreading and cause my soil to become very clay like which is there preferred enviroment. So a big fuck u to DE for our type of growing... That's the one of the reasons my treatments took so long, i painstakingly scrapped the several inches of de off all of my plants and replaced it all with worm castings, yah!

I'm going to stop using bug buster o after today as someone on this thread say it kills your microbiology and that will just make our plants more susceptible to these things. As someone mentioned they dont do as well in sandy soil or if the plants are healthy and they're root resistant.

"I'm guessing pyrethrins on plants with mycorhizzae is even worse than without.

Any thoughts on that?"

Yah, we need to find a solution other then the very temporary pyrethrins. SOmething systemic. That's why i'm goign to go with a pure neem feeding schedule whenever i water. I hear with repeated neem drenches cause the neem to become systemic.

I would like to re-iterate that even though this is a serious problem that requires persistance and a relentess attitude on our part, my plants are looking the best they have since I first become aware of the problem. Many of them are perky and beginning to turn green again. So i'm only gaining more confidence that this can be solved, and if i have to put fourty hours a week into this, so be it, patients and myself count on it

I'm still waiting for an effective systemic solution. I'm even seriously considering switchign mediums from dirt to something else. Does anyone think these things would be less of a problem in coca, hydro, or aeroponics? Thoughts please.

 

[clowntown]

I'm growing in coco, and I'm having problems.

It is easier in that I can do drenches whenever I want w/o the worry of over-watering, I suppose.

I think hydroton growers can have this problem, too.

...

I wonder if a thick layer of mulch would help in keeping the adults out of the soil. Perhaps something inorganic, and fast-drying, like a 2-3 inch layer of hydroton on top of the surface, after some BBO (or whatever) applications?

I'm still undecided on whether BBO was ineffective in killing the adults, or whether it was effective in killing the adults but failing to kill the eggs.

I'm also still stuck on deciding whether to flower 'em out and clean and/or move, or go for a multi-application (every 3-4 days) BBO treatment with the risk of losing or seriously fucking up the plants which are on their 4th week of flower.

A lot of time invested in this crop so far, and I'd hate to turn up with nothing because I'm down to just crappy leftover phenos to smoke on.

Really shitty decision to make.

This sucks.

So far it feels like we got it worse than anyone else, even people with spider mites. Because these seem like truly indestructible pests straight from hell.

 

[halloweed2006]

I was thinking today of doing one co2 nuke. Go and renting a co2 cansiter filling it, and keeping the room at 2000+ ppm for several hours. What do you
think? Also, what do you think of botanigard as a possible solution? I've heard several growers say they've had success with it.

So far it feels like we got it worse than anyone else, even people with spider mites. Because these seem like truly indestructible pests straight from hell.

If floramite did not exist, i'd say you're wrong, but beause we don't have a florumite for aphids I'd say you're right

Wikipedia has an utterly fascinating article on phylloxera i recommend everyone check it out (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Phylloxera). I read the article on wikipedia about Phylloxera and I'm not sure that's what we have. THe pictures don't match what I"m seeing under the microscope. Hell, scientists are still debating what species phylloxera falls under. But then again what we have certainly isn't the regular aphid. I'm pretty sure most aphids go after the foliage, stock and stem. These fuckers hide under 5 gallons of soil!

Well i'm going to go to the drawing board and see if I can't come up with any more possible solutions. Oh btw, i'd love to hear a botanigard report on these things. I'm going to buy it in a day or two when I can get some more information on the type i need and the dosages.

 

[clowntown]

Will high concentrations of CO2 kill them? If so, will it kill the eggs too? If not, you're right back to square 1 again. But if it will work it sounds like the least invasive of the treatments so far, since you can repeat every few days to kill the new babies. Assuming that high of a level doesn't harm plants; I heard above 1800ppm is harmful. Also, is your room sealed? If you don't already have a CO2 setup, I'm guessing it's not.

Yeah, Botanigard is one of the more highly recommended ones. (Anyone interested in splitting the cost of a bottle of Botanigard? )

Yeah, I agree that "phylloxera" might not necessarily be exactly what I have, but that's the closest thing I've seen on this board about it and I'm just looking for treatment options that work on these root-eating fuckers, regardless of what their name is. Of course it helps to be able to positively identify them to get more information for treatment, but oh well.

 

[cabbageman]

The best way to handle this is to totally toss the infested medium and plants. Between me and Scay Beez we've covered almost everything there is out there from beneficial to chemical. If you tossed everything and started over i wouldn't have to say this: Good luck

Quoted for truth.

 

[S4vvy]

Clowntown

With all due respect, changing apartments is goin a lil overboard. If you handle your biz this pest will not be back after you toss everything and clean your place up.

For those that don't have these pests i'd like to say this. This is a pest problem that usually get spread from grower to grower thru ignorance. Most of you will never just casually get this problem, it will be given to you from a friend and he/she won't know he has it. Filter your intakes, patch all holes in your growroom, quarantine clones that you accept as simple branches - no roots. If you do that you will more than likely Never see this problem

 

[clowntown]

You're probably right, S4vvy.

It's just that I live in a small studio, and it's hard for me to be able to get it completely clean to the point that I'd like to w/o virtually moving out. I can't easily bomb the place either, since I live here.

Anyways, yeah mine was transferred from another grower. Hard lessons learned.

Can you cut fairly recently rooted clones off at the stem, and re-root them? I'm curious if it'd be safe to buy clones, cut 'em off at the stem on the spot (or close to it) to avoid the roots? Not that I've really ever bought clones from clubs, but just an example.

 

[halloweed2006]

Clowntown, i got my aphids from a sonoma county dispensery. They came with some OGK abusives, actually that soil was beyond fucked up i.e. gnats, spider mites and aphids and root aphids. Gnats, spider mitse and aphids have been eradicated. Now it's just this fucker. I busted out the Aphid CHasers, used all 8 that came with the package. I"ll get some more and go crazy on my room and see if it makes a difference.

 

[clowntown]

Do any of you use enzymes / enzyme products?

I'm asking because for a while I hadn't been using CannaZym, since I ran out and was broke. Finally got around to getting another bottle, and after about a week I couldn't find any more bugs by digging the surface.

Are these things eating away only dead, rotting roots, and don't have much to feed on when roots are healthy?

I'm sorely confused that this CannaZym, above all things, is helping. It could be merely coincidence, and I'd write it off as such... but I do remember the root of the problem seemed to be from a pot of wet coco w/ dead roots & a stump sitting in it (which has been sitting that way for ~2 months), which was TOTALLY infested with these bugs.

Damn I'm confused.

 

[Scay Beez]

The bugs have bacteria in their stomachs that produce furasium(?) and they spit it out at the roots and the roots start to break down and then the bugs consumed the predigested roots. At least that's how I understand it. Using an enzyme would break down their food source. It will also make the roots healthier and give them a growth boost in their current state.


- sbz

 

[bobs your uncle]

OK, I'll jump back in here with my experience with these buggers.

My infestation come from a bag of Fox Farm Original Planting Mix that I picked up out at Three B's Nursery in the avenues. The bags were stored outside in the elements, and at the time, soil bags being stored outside weren't a red flag for me, and is arguably probably where 90% of your average consumer picks up his or her soil, from outside stacks in the elements. Of course you can get it from new cuts being brought into your grow, but the original source can probably be traced back to someone's soil purchase. And to be fair, this has nothing to do with FoxFarn or Three B's Nursery. Once a bag of soil leaves any manufacturer's distribution point, it's more than likely it's going to be stored outside at some time and the nursery I purchased mine from was only doing what it has always done, stack em outside. Buyer beware!

Lest any of you forget or haven't read through this whole post, here's a couple of pics of my infestation that I posted earlier in this thread.








I remember the first time I took a magnifying glass to the top of my pots to see what was going on. Teeming, doesn't even get close to what I saw. The coco (my grow was all coco except for one pot of Moonshine Mix, hence the soil purchase) wasn't even visible under the complete carpet of bugs.

I hit em with hot water drenches and Bug Buster O (not at the same time) and it seemed to do the trick for the most part. The hot water drenches sound scary I know, but trust me, you wont kill your plants if you do it right. Google "hot water drench" and root aphids or fungus gnats, phylloxera.

You just have to do what you can and ride this grow out. Toss the medium when you're done and clean your containers and grow area. If your moms are infected, take cuts, then toss them. All infected medium has to go, no exceptions. Even if you don't see any buggers on certain pots, if they're in the same room with infected ones- take cuts and toss em. I know starting over sounds extreme, but isn't that what we do after each finished grow anyways, start over?

My next grow has had no sign of those root aphids and it's only because there is no medium from that infested grow carried over to the new grow. Fungus gnats, well thats a different story, but no more root aphids and I had em bad.

 

[clowntown]

I don't think krowmobe posts on this site anymore, so I'll quote from a different site (which I think I'm forbidden from mentioning or linking on this site).

I got them from a clone. I tried everything you could think of. I mean I was on 5-6 different grow sites trying t kill them. The sm90 and peroxide killed alot but not all of them. Tobacco,pepper sprays,avid and floramite barely hurt them. Then I got a pm from a guy named hydroking telling me to drowned them with scorpian juice. It killed them all in seconds and they never came back.

I just happen to have a bottle lying around, and will give it a shot today.

Bottle-recommended application rate is pretty high (10mL per L), but I'm gonna go full-strength recommended dosage and hope that'll be the end of it all. If all goes well, I'll use the remainder of the bottle to do another dose in 2-3 weeks as the bottle recommends. I'm sure all this is too much, but I don't care, I want to make sure I don't have to deal with this shit again.

Skipping the foliar, since I believe soaking the medium with this will be enough since the problem is below the surface.

I'll let y'all know how it goes.

 

[clowntown]

Scorpion Juice didn't work. At least not like krowmobe described.

I forgot to mention, but CannaZym also didn't kill the bugs off... just seemed to be a coincidence I guess that I couldn't spot any at that time. Just seems like not as many, but still there and alive. They come out to the surface especially after a watering, I suppose to get some air and keep from drowning.

I'm gonna give another application of Scorpion Juice on the next watering, and then I'll just throw in the towel like Scay Beez and hope for the best when I start over completely clean.

Hopefully the yields won't be hurt too bad on this run, because I plan on finishing 'em out. Starting week 5 today.

Three weeks, some sanity, and many dollars ago, Scay Beez told me:

If you think you have these insects clowtown, then take your strains back to cutting and don't think twice about it.

For any of you who might be reading this now, or in the future... I suggest you follow that advice before wasting your time, money, health and everything else fighting these bastards. Unless a real solid solution comes up.

I'd love to hear other peoples' results with Scorpion Juice.

 

[krowmobe]

root aphids

root aphids

Sorry man! I didnt tell you how much to use. use 80ml per gallon of water. I used 10 gallons of water with 800ml. I flooded my tray full of rockwool and drowned them in it. it was bad ass for sure. I had tried everything!! I used sm90, peroxide, tobbacco, pepper juice, neamitodes, ladybugs, neem, avid, floramite, bug be gone. they all killed some. sm90 and peroxide almost got them all but nope. As soon as Hydroking told me to try scorpian juice at double the recomended dose they were gone. I called all my brothers that also had them and by the next morning there wasnt any root aphids in any of our grows.Hydroking helped save over 10lbs of GDP all together. I havent seen any since. I had them about a year ago. Thanks Hydroking where ever you are.

 

[halloweed2006]

Hmm I gotta try the scorpion juice.. I'm keeping them down and my plants look lush, but i'm still spraying neem everyweek and they always seem to start showing up the day before my neem treatments.

 

[Scay Beez]

krowmobe: You are saying one application of Scorpion Juice (Salicylic Acid) will kill them all? Were you on a continuous cycle with your crops when you had root aphids or did you just finish up a crop and ditch the soil? I'm not completely convinced because more toxic chemicals with longer duration in the soil don't kill them. If so, hydroking is the man. Has anybody experienced these bugs in hydro and/or in non-coastal environments?

clowntown: If you try the scorpion juice again, let us know.


- sbz

 

[clowntown]

Scorpion Juice at 2x recommended dose (20mL/L) didn't do anything different than the 1x, or plain water, for me. (Besides producing more foam after mixing.)

 

[NorCal]

damn it sucks but im here to check in and say i got these problems also

Im gonna try to talk to a couple different peeps that know whats up and see what they recommend, or what my options are, it sucks that after reading through 8 pages on this i come to find out its like a cancer where the odds are really against you

whats worst is my lease is almost up and i was really hoping to squeeze this last crop out as i dont have enough time to reveg and flower etc at this point.

this is really gonna suck, one friend already suggested using merit 75
look it up and lemme know what you guys think

i should have a few more product recommendations as soon as I get ahold of some friends who have dealt with this issue before

 

[bodhiseeds]

my mom room a few years ago got over ran with root aphids, i tryed everything, spent hundreds of dollars, freaked my plants out, and almost gave up. so finnaly i went to OSH and picked up the chem stuff, osh lawn and garden insect killer and watered with it ,making sure the liquid reached the whole medium and bam problem solved no more root aphids. im super organic, but in the end the chem saved my ass. hope this helps, i know how you feel....