aphids

[greyghost]

Does anyone know of a spray or treatment that will kill aphids and spider mites without harming lady bugs

 

[Hoppy2bmerry]

Lady bug should be eating the aphids. And unfortunately no to answer your question.

 

[greyghost]

Did some research. Neem Oil

 

[passedpawn]

I haven't used neem oil on aphids, but I can tell you it works on mealybugs and does NOT work for white flies.

It smells like fish BTW.

 

[postalbunny]

I ordered lady bugs off amazon... to my surprise it actually works. I did not know you could cheaply and easily buy/ship them online. I bought either 1,000 or 3,000... for around $10-20. I released a few hundred every couple days just in case any particular day they all just flew away. Seemed to work, aphids went away.

 

[FloppyKnockers]

I bought ladybugs to get rid of aphids, then spiders ate the ladybugs, then some frogs ate the spiders. Long story short - now I have bears.

 

[JohnSand]

Soap and tobacco kill most insects. I used to make a spray from cigar butts and dish soap.
I had aggressive caterpillars on my hops this season, a dusting of diatomaceous earth took care of them.

 

[nagmay]

To deal with aphids, you need to understand how they eat. Unlike caterpillars and many other pests who munch on the leaves, aphids instead pierce the leaves and suck out this juices directly. This means that pesticides sprayed on the leaves will not be ingested and are mostly ineffective.

Because of this, I would not recommend neem or tobacco.

In practice, I have found that these are all good options:

• Spray aphids directly with a soapy water mixture. This destroys their protective waxy coating.
• Remove large concentrations of aphids by directly spraying with a hose.
• Defoliate the lower few feet of leaves from the bines. This keeps many of the aphids you knock off from climbing back up.

But by far the best option (as others have recommended) are ladybugs. The ladybug larva are voracious eaters and aphid are are the top of their menu.