Thank you! I will keep an eye on the aphids - we have the tanglefoot traps up and are hoping that they will keep the ants away enough to allow the beneficials to eat the aphids. But at the moment there seem to be an awful lot of aphids and lots of leaves curling. Any ideas what the bugs are that are all over the tanglefoot? The small black flying ones?

There is bird netting secured across the entire top of each bed. The bird netting also descends maybe a third of the way down each side and is attached tightly to the sides of the "cage" beds to make sure there aren't any places for birds to get through. Do you mean that the top coverage should be heftier than it is now (like with chicken wire or hardware cloth instead of bird netting)? Is one inch chicken wire too large to keep birds out? Does this mean that the pest is likely birds? Thank you for your response!

The photos are not very clear but I'd suspect worm castings. So nothing you want to get rid of... it is just the very nutrient rich poop of garden worms :-) Just rake to smooth or ignore.

You can get sprays or pellets/tablets. The pellets usually include fertiliser to promote uptake. They're designed to be used in pots. You always need to read the information that comes with the product. They're supposed to have a safety data sheet which just about covers everything. If the safety data sheet is missing off the product ask the retailer for one. You can also get them off the internet. They're sometimes called a Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) or just Safety Data Sheet (SDS). Read them before you buy so that you're well informed. I've never used them on potted plants but don't believe there'd be any greater issues than you'd get with inground plants. I used a spray one on an Abiu for Mealy Bugs that ants were bringing in. Eventually got rid of the ants as well so there wouldn't be any reoccurrence. Used the pellets on a Ficus tree with Thrips but the tree was far too large and it wasn't very effective. A potted tree is small so you're bound to get results.