Any Commerical Aphid Killer?

[Lee]

Originally Posted by Vespertino

I even tried squashing them on sight.

Lady bugs and lacewings aren't a good solution since this is isolated to one or two plants and I have an apartment balcony patio not a yard.

Does this mean they survived your squishing? If so, squish harder!

With only one or two plants on a balcony, I would think this
is really the best solution... although it sounds like you might
have to do it every morning for a week to get it under control.

Do you have ants that are transporting the aphids to your plants? I've seen this before, especially on the purple hull cow peas.....

Good luck!

Lee

[Redbaron]

Originally Posted by danielnc84

toxic or not i just want something that is quick reliable and effective. I dont do alot of the whole green stuff. I would rather just find a quality chemical that will get the job done!

And you wonder why the issue? The only true "solution" to the problem is build up a large predatory population of lady bugs, lace wings, and predatory mites. But since you are not a "whole green stuff" kind of guy, those predators don't stand a chance. Since they don't stand a chance, nothing to stop the aphids.

All those predators are effective and available for sale the same as any chemical insecticide. They are more expensive, but have the added benefit of persisting once the population stabilizes.

If you insist on taking the short term chemical approach. That's fine. But keep in mind ants will spread aphids too. No spray will work unless you also deal with the ants which farm aphids. We milk cows. Ants milk aphids.

Now for biological approaches, I try to use trap crops. ie things that attract aphids but that aphids seldom actually kill. In my location that is sunflowers. Sunflowers are too tough to let aphids kill them, but the aphids around here really like them, especially when it starts getting hot and dry. So once I see a sunflower with aphids I simply put Diatomaceous Earth around the base of the plant in a circle barrier to discourage the ant protectors. That lets my predators go to town on them without having to fight with the ants. Those lady bugs reproduce, fly away, and pick off any starting aphid colonies elsewhere in the garden. Works about ~80% +/- of the time like a charm. The other 20% of the time I try to use some method that discourages aphids rather than kills them. Extremely hot home made hot pepper spray seems to do the trick. I take some super hots, put them in a blender with hot water and a bit of vodka. Then I filter the resulting mix with a coffee filter. Spray that on the plants being attacked and aphids have a tendency to find a weed somewhere to attack instead.

[Vespertino]

Originally Posted by Lee

Does this mean they survived your squishing? If so, squish harder!

With only one or two plants on a balcony, I would think this
is really the best solution... although it sounds like you might
have to do it every morning for a week to get it under control.

Do you have ants that are transporting the aphids to your plants? I've seen this before, especially on the purple hull cow peas.....

Good luck!

Lee

I'm wondering if the aphids that keep coming back are the angry ghost of the ones I smushed! Luckily I don't have any ants, so that at least makes things slightly less complicated.

On the bright side the aphids are under control again, and I've eradicated them from the borage. I think I just need to keep spraying more often than I was, and follow the advice to keep squishing them when I see them. As a precaution I'm spraying the tomato plants sparingly with the oil spray to prevent any aphids from jumping ship. I may step it up to a stronger spray if that doesn't work- I'll probably try the malathilon or the ferti-lome triple action II which is stronger than their triple action I that I'm using.

[rnewste]

Personally, I would avoid the use of Malathion. From Wikipedia: "Malathion itself is of low toxicity; however, absorption or ingestion into the human body readily results in its metabolism to malaoxon, which is substantially more toxic."

Instead, consider the use of Take Down Garden Spray which is canola oil based.

Raybo