Sorry to bother you all but can you help me?

[b54red]

I went ahead and ordered 50 lbs of the food grade DE yesterday. I will try it on spider mites which are showing up now that we are experiencing 100 degree days with little rain, especially on my older plants. What I plant to do with most of it is use it in my dog houses to combat fleas and sprinkled all over my garden to see if it will work against slugs. Slugs have been present in huge numbers in my garden since I started it nearly 40 years ago and I haven't found anything that really diminishes their numbers significantly. I have bought boxes and bags of slug bait and used them to no avail. Keeping my fingers crossed hoping this stuff will do the trick.


Bill

[Sun City Linda]

Has anyone tried that spray with Tomato Russet Mites?

[efisakov]

I used it on ants around my house. It worked.

[luigiwu]

Evidence of it is all of the sudden very-in-my-face. I don't know if it has anything to do with the extreme hot weather we've been having.
I didn't have any DE and probably won't be able to get some until this weekend. So I'm trying 1 tablespoon of Dr Bronners Peppermint Castille soap with 1 quart of water. I hope it does something. Now that I know what to look for, I think it always starts from my eggplant.

Whaddya guys think of this pic?

[peebee]

Yup luigiwu that's what my eggplants w/ spider mites look like too. The only vegetable plants they don't bother seem to be peppers. Just as an experiment, I am growing one bean plant (another mite attractor) in the middle of a circle of pepper plants. So far, so good. I have more beans, in pots, in another part of the garden that have not seen many mites. But I am seeing some signs of them now. So I will start that DE spray tomorrow; we'll see.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by feldon30

I searched Google for diatomaceous earth and vegetable gardens and get thousands of results of people successfully using it. Numerous experts say as long as you use food grade vs. pool filter DE, you are good to go. Not sure why Garden Safe is having trouble meeting this standard.

As for their Garden Safe Fruit & Vegetable Insect Killer, the concentrations seem incredibly low to be effective. Just 0.02% Pyrethrins and .20% Piperonyl Butoxide.

That is an incredibly small amount to be effective against mites. I think it would be better to buy something with a bit more punch because they are very hard to kill. I used a dog shampoo that had the same ingredients but at much higher concentrations and it was only moderately effective against them. I ended up finding a Permethrin poison that was more effective especially if used with very soapy water but I want to avoid it if possible so I will try the DE today and see if it does any good. I really hope it does because at 4 Tablespoons of DE to the gallon it would be the cheapest thing I have ever tried to get rid of spider mites and even cheaper than soapy water. I am going to be using a large back pack sprayer and hope it doesn't settle out and clog my sprayer. I wonder if adding a little soap would help it stay suspended without affecting how it acts against mites.

Bill

[Gerardo]

Originally Posted by b54red

I am going to be using a large back pack sprayer and hope it doesn't settle out and clog my sprayer. I wonder if adding a little soap would help it stay suspended without affecting how it acts against mites.

Bill

I used it last night at and added a few drops of dishsoap and as long as you're in motion, the stuff does not settle. It's practically flour. I think you'll have good results. Hit 'em a few times during their cycle.

No more stippling!

[luigiwu]

I gotta get me some of this DE stuff then... Gerardo, report back your results!

[b54red]

I sprayed the DE yesterday so it will be a few days before I see if I get any results. I used a far higher amount of DE in my solution and it sprayed without any problems. I used between two and three tablespoons to the qt and it left a definite white residue on the leaves when it dried. The reason I used the higher concentration was because my spider mite problem had gotten really bad on over half my plants with only the upper leaves showing no damage yet. Even my newest plants set out a month ago were starting to show spider mites though the worst were my older plants. I will repeat the process on my more seriously affected plants again in a few days.

I'm keeping my fingers crossed because if this works I am going to be extremely happy to find a solution this simple and cheap. Before the only thing that seemed to work consistently was spraying ever few days for weeks with a strong soapy water solution along with Permethrin. The problem with that is it usually takes out all the good bugs along with the spider mites.

Bill

Bill

[b54red]

So far I can't tell if the DE is working yet on the spider mites because the plants are suffering from the heat and lack of a good rain. I'm going out this morning if I can and give them a dose of TTF and follow up with some extra watering because it is just so hot and dry right now. By late afternoon I should see improvement in the plants appearance if the mite attack has been slowed. If not I may have to resort to using the poison sprays otherwise I will have no tomatoes come fall.

Bill

[efisakov]

Bill, it will work. It needs to be applied again after rain or on the new growing leafs. The problem is that it does not eradicate them for good. They are coming back year after year.
I really want to find a way to get rid of them for good. We need some biological not chemical solution.

[b54red]

Originally Posted by efisakov

Bill, it will work. It needs to be applied again after rain or on the new growing leafs. The problem is that it does not eradicate them for good. They are coming back year after year.
I really want to find a way to get rid of them for good. We need some biological not chemical solution.

Hey I will be happy with anything that is non toxic that works. When they are really bad like now I haven't found any of the organic or safe solutions to even be worth the effort. Even poisons are only somewhat effective and only if applied with a lot of soap in order to penetrate their webbing.

Bill

[Gerardo]

I liKe the powdery white visual effect the DE leaves behind. I came out the other day and thought Denzel was gonna shoot an arrow at me, my garden had that overexposed Salt Flats looK to it.

Way cooler than the Daconil white.

[peebee]

I finally got around to trying it on a few of my potted eggplants and tomatoes on my patio today.
It's too late for my in-ground garden, it seems like you look away for a day and then the entire tomato plant is covered head to toe with webbing now, whereas the day before the webbing was not visible yet. Sigh. So I harvested all the tomatoes from the 2 plants (got about a 5-gal bucket full!) and pulled them out. My palms were sandy from all the mites I touched. I still have a few plants that are ok. The hybrids seem to succumb faster, that's what I removed today.
So we'll see how the potted ones do in the next few days. For biological control, I'm gonna do the solarization of my soil again after the season is over. At least it will kill all the eggs. Then cover crop. I know, I know, I sound like a broken record but it really revived my tired beds and I got a huge harvest this year so even tho the mites got me again, it was waaaaay later than last year and I'm happy. I have a feeling the spider mites are here to stay from now on. Is it just me, or does it seem like more and more people are reporting them now?

[b54red]

It does seem to be working somewhat but I am still seeing some mites on the leaves but they could just be the newly hatched ones moving around or maybe I checked on leaves that I somehow missed but I doubt it. I will reapply it on the worst looking plants and will use an even stronger solution. I found that more than double worked better as to coverage so maybe 4X will be even better. I have noticed an almost total lack of any kind of insects on my plants the last two times I checked so it may be really putting away some insects both good and bad. I can't wait to try it on my slug problem once I get another Powder Mill duster to apply it to the soil with. My old one broke after 5 years so it was a really good duster. I just wish someone would make one like that with metal parts that would really hold up to some abuse.

Bill