I can't believe this I spent 2 hours responding to your post' internet went down and the whole thing was lost. Honestly it was more a novel than a response. I shall answer again in the morning. At the end of responce I mentioned something I've always wanted to say. To you and 2 Kates a few others. You are always there to help others with such kindness. Everytime a persons been ridculed on here one of you will show up with a spirit lifting responce and that is something I hope you all are proud of. I'm sure if I noticed many many others have also. The world needs lots of kindhearts. I'll bet alot of people would like to come on here and share garden problems and expertice but fear being ridiculed in some way and that is sad. Anyway I had surgery Friday and the painkillers made me do it-answer a post with no fear that is. So good night I'll answer in morning. Pat

It is pretty nearly impossible to prevent thrips. I have only seen one method, but it is labor intensive as well as cost prohibitive. The person I know who has invented/used it only does so for the blooms he plans to enter in various shows. You couldn't really do it for all your blooms. His email address is jgodwin@lowcountry.com

My preventative is that I'm getting rid of the worst whites and white blends and replacing them with darker roses:) Otherwise I just have to wait out the 3 months that the blooms are thrips infested and about Oct/Nov have nice blooms again. I'm giving the roses to my girlfriend, she doesn't mind spraying, I won't, I can't see that it works.

Ann is right.
I don't know which I despise more, thrips or japenese beetles!

Carla

Last night I googled thrips control read 3 or 4 responces, then did search on both rose forums. I didn't know that thrips behave much the same as midge. They over winter in the ground emerge as adults in spring and lay their eggs in rose bush, larva hatch do their damage fall to the ground and it all begins again. I've gardened about 20 years and except for in the begining and last year never used insecticides. Not for any holy reason but because no matter what you do you can't kill them all, the thrips u miss quickly become immune to the insecticide that your using. This is the only thing of which I'm positive, man has tried to control not elimenate bugs by creating new pesticides as older ones become inaffective.Only resently are we beginning to find other ways that may work better in the long run. A side note ( god save the south if chilli thrips spread) midge will destroy my roses but chilli thrips are also a great threat to agriculture not just our roses. I'm sorry this is what I did last night one thought lead to another and I couldn't STOP. Doesn't it make you mad to know that if we had seen the damage and known what it was when only a couple of bushes were infected there was a good chance of total elimenation. Last night I had 4 approaches to deal with thrips but found one more some believe you can blast adult midge with water to remove them from your bushes. I'll talk more on this latter. My choices where 1. All out nuclear warfare, 2. least toxic approach I could fined but still using pesticides 3. release predators 4. wait for mother nature to come to my rescue. Now 5. water blasting. Last year after allowing midge to explode threw 400+ rose bushes,I panicked and chose no.1. It was June before I knew what was happening so my chance to catch them early was already gone. Sad side note midge solved thrips problem, no blooms-no thrips damage. (grrrrrr) I will NEVER do no.1 again. By July I was having adult versions of a tempertantum. Thretening to burn my yard to the ground because I'd ruined everything anyway. to make matters worse my kitties where playing in pesticides liking their fur and paws. Oh with no.1 besure to add miticides or constantly water spray bushes cause there will be no one left to eat your spider mites. No.1 bad idea but I thought I had to do something to reduce the numbers of midge before anything else would work. No.3 I think is the best of all choices but my garden is too large and I can't afford it. Would think predators would work for thrips but is expensive and must have thrips present for them to eat. No.4 I don't know for thrips but for midge I have not found any one yet that can give an example of mother nature being able to handle this little monster without help.
So I like your idea of an early strike. This is my plan for year two only. A dormant oil spray If your garden is small enough I'd do two sprays mixing up your mulch before second spray to kill as many thrips as you can before your bushes start any growth as this will damage new growth. Then as soon as my roses start to leaf out I'll put down Bayer Advanced Granular with midge listed as targeted pest and yes I'll put more down in about a month. Not sure about the timing yet. What ever insecticide you use make sure thrips are listed. Next for 9.95 and shipping I found a cute little bug blaster. Google bug blaster to take a look. It sprays water 360 degrees giving great looking coverage top and bottom of leaves should be great for spider mites and removing dieased leaves. Haven't used it, yet I'm kind of thinking I'm gonna get wet. For use with thrips you would need to put out sticky tape, if or when you catch an adult thrip spray right away. I never thought of that before now. When I sprayed insecticides last year if I had put out sticky traps at least I would have sprayed at the right time. Darn it too late now. O'kay, sum it up. If you want to get them hit em early hit em hard. Mike Rivers does a lot better than I ever could at explaining chemicals but if spraying isecticides rotate sprays to help with resistance. I want to add sprays with different modes of action, but I don't know how to explain it. Forgot year three, hope to begin to restore balance. Will use dormant oil and one grandular application. Diversify,maybe this will not help but I'll be adding more type 3 clematis. The ones I have were healthy without spray Bloomed from end of June till frost with dead heading, beautiful flowers. What more could I ask for. More daylillies, lillies, echinacea, plox, hardy geraniums. I'm might be wrong it just seems that it might bring more good guys to the yard or something. Lord I wrote a novel again I'm sorry. Please every one, if I said something incorrect let me know but say it gently. Thanks Pat

Hi everyone, Thanks so much for the responses.

Pattyw5, Thanks so much for the sweet comments. I appreciate everyone on here trying to help each other out and it does get me upset when someone speaks ugly or ridicules another when all they are simply asking for is help. I would say 99% of our posters are great, helpful and kind people. Its just a few that say something ugly so I think I have to get on here and defend whoever for whatever reason. Yes you are right, there are a bunch of us on here ready to defend our fellow gardeners. On to thrips.... I am so glad you didn't burn down your yard last summer. ha ha!! I am not sure what midge is. I probably have those too. I have never used the Bayer granules but I have used the Bayer advanced for roses and tree and shrub for my crepe myrtles. I do spray now that I have added so many roses but I never did until this past year. I don't spray regularly and my sister has a pond down the hill from me so I don't really want to hurt her fish. I was going to spray a dormant spray but I can't find any anywhere. Don't you just love phlox and lilies?? I use the Bayer on them and never have any mildew anymore. Alrighty thanks again for the kind words and I look forward to you posting some pictures this spring. P.S. Doesn't the internet just drive you crazy after you type a whole bunch and then it goes bonkers. Thanks, Judy

Ann, We have hay fields behind us so I reckon they are coming from there too. Don't really want to hang cups all over either so I guess I will just try to deal. I sure don't want to make it toxic everywhere either. Wish there was some homemade mix out there that would blast those babies and everything else would be safe. Thanks, Judy

Thanks Roseman and Les, Not sure I want to do anything extensive either. Just tooooo lazy. I reckon I will see how it goes this year and may just not get many more new light ones.

Hi Carla, I agree!! I hate beetles and thrips. arrrgh!!

Thanks a bunch everyone, Judy

I don't have an answer to the original question, but I will say that thrips have been gradually increasing in my coastal Calif garden. It used to be that their damage was only during the latter half of the first flush, or first part of the second flush, and then they were gone. As the past ten years have gone by, the thrips are now pretty much always there. I am pruning my roses now in zone 9B (coastal So. Calif), and today when I pruned Memorial Day (a very fragrant pink), I picked apart a partially unfurled bloom and found a fair number of thrips in it. This was particularly depressing, since it's been down to the low 30s overnight frequently, and highs in the upper 50s and lower 60s recently. So it seems as if they are now a constant low to high level presence here. Alas... They do tend to prefer fragrant roses even more than light roses, it's just easier to see the damage on the light ones.

Susan

Yep, Miss Judy is a keeper for sure and sweet. My long-distance penpal; I only wish she lived closer (or maybe not...I wouldn't wish our cold minus below zero weather coming this week on her).
-terry

I'll keep an eye on this post. All of my roses, including the dark ones are affected and have been since April. It is less this time of year, but I still see some damage. I hope someone has a good idea for prevention, or even getting rid of them once they arrive. I do spray but as it's been said they become immune.
Nancy

It's nice to have found some other folks to talk to about my current obsession. It took a long time to figure out what was causing the damage to my basil, rosemary, etc. I grow all my herbs in my house. I have decided not to burn the house down-yet. I am attempting 100% elimination because they cause severe damage to my young plants that I hope to sell--and because the population can explode so quickly. Sad to think that in just a few months they'll come in again on clothing & pets, through open doors and window screens, etc. I will have to be sure my grow lights go off before dusk, replace my blue porch lights with some other color and never have an open window while the computer or tv is on--and no blue night lights. (Blue light really draws them in).
I don't know about a thrip preventive. I thought adding some cinnamon essential oil to my homemade soap spray might give it an extra kick. Instead, it seemed to draw the adults out of every nook and cranny onto the leaves once the spray was dried. Maybe I'll figure out a way to use that to my advangtage.
I have eliminated most of my plants, but am 'nuking them' with a green approach. I figure since the thrips are indoors at 75 degrees they have optimum conditions and will complete their life cycles quickly. I looked up their life cycle (there may be some variations since there are SO many different types of thrips) and planned accordingly. A fast life cycle goes something like this:
* Eggs (protected inside leaf tissue): 2.5 days
* Feeding Stages I & II: 3 days
* Pre Pupa & Pupa (protected in soil): 2 days
* Adult: up to 45 days-and whither do they wander? Everywhere!

My plan of attack:
* Eggs-using a light behind the leaves, I can often see the eggs inside and prune those leaves off.
* Feeding Stages-the only real opportunity to kill them with a spray, just a 3 day window to kill a generation. So,to really knock them out I have to spray every 2 or 3 days (at the longest) since new eggs are hatching daily. If you wait 4 days, you will miss an entire generation. Wait 5 days and you'll miss 2 generations, etc. I think this is why so many people have problems eliminating them--they just aren't spraying often enough in terms of the thrips' life cycle.
* Pre Pupa & Pupa-I immerse the pots in water for a few minutes. Lots of pupa rise to the top and I get rid of them by pouring off the water. Then I spray with a sulfur soap spray & hope it kills any others that are on top of the soil. (Sulfur works on them and since they don't have a cocoon to protect them, this should be effective.) Then I BAG the pots and tie the bag snugly to the stem. This breaks the cycle of the larva being able to hide in the soil to pupate (although they don't HAVE to be in soil to pupate), so it leaves them out in the open where they can be rinsed off.
* Adults-I use a shop vac to blow around the lights and shelves of my plant stands to stir them up, then I vacuum them out of the air. Sticky traps also help a bit in reducing their numbers, but vacuuming seems to work best.

As you can imagine, all this is very time intensive, but I think it will make things much easier once I increase the number of plants. Then, I will just have to be disciplined to spray everything every 2 or 3 days no matter what. I will not wait to see an adult, since they live so long and lay so many eggs. I never want it to get to that point again. I will probably keep bagging pots too. It helps counter my tendency to overwater.

Now, to complete this novel, what I spray with:
Since resistance develops quickly, I use methods to which I doubt they can become resistant (vacuuming, drowning, chemically burning). The particular strain of thrips I have is resistant to pyrethrin and it seems most of the sprays readily available are pyrethrin based-avoid them, because even if 'your' thrips aren't pyrethrin resistant, they do develop resistance to it quickly. I plan to try a spray with Spinosad (a bacteria similar to the one that produces the antibiotic 'Actinomycin'). It is recommended to use very sparingly so resistance doesn't develop.
I believe there is value in neem oil, though I haven't seen it working yet.
I spray every 3 days (at the longest) with a homemade soap spray (Murphy's Oil Soap, original formula-2 Tablespoons per gallon of water).
Every other time I spray ( = once every 6 days) I include 2 teaspoons of Neem Oil in that gallon of soap spray.
Once in a while I add up to 4 teaspoons of olive or canola oil (to 1 gal. of soap spray). The oil does tend to cause burning of the leaf tips where it beads up and drips off. I think if I timed it so that the plants weren't under the lights when wet, that could be prevented.
The soap in the spray should burn/smother thrips, the oil will smother them.

** In terms of a dormant oil spray (which was mentioned in someone's post above)--I think you could make your own. I think the principal is just to cover the plant (and eggs) with a heavy oil spray, to smother the eggs and any other overwintering life stages, while the plant is without leaves. I think you could google and find out what concentration of oil to mix with soap and water.

A thought to ponder: what each of us does in our hobby in our yard today could affect our food supply a few years down the road. If we overuse a pesticide and create a resistant strain of thrips in our backyard, the wind will spread those little buggers far and wide and soon we will have a POPULATION that are resistant! That makes another control option worthless for farmers.

There is no quick fix. It takes time & energy. And you have to 'know your enemy' to outwit them. I know that my methods would not work the same way outdoors, but maybe you can get some ideas from them.
* Learn to identify damage early and prune it off.
* Use water or soap spray and SPRAY FREQUENTLY.
* If a plant is constantly heavily affected-dispose of it if you can. (Why nurture a steady supply of pest in your yard?)
* If you discover a plant that is quick and easy to grow and seems to be a magnet for them, something they prefer to the plants you prize, consider growing it as a trap and then destroying it (and all the thrips it has on it). It might help reduce the damage on the plants you prefer.
* Consider reducing the number of pupae by using plastic sheeting as mulch, instead of organic matter. The larvae that land there (trust me, we're talking tens of thousands of them . . .) should bake in the sun. How much better if you could find blue plastic!
* Silly as it sounds, consider using a vacuum with a HEPA filter to trap them. Hold the hose in one hand and jostle the plants with a stick in your other hand. Then vacuum them out of the air. Each female you catch is several hundred larvae prevented!
* Blue sticky traps placed near your best plants may help a lot too. And NO BLUE LIGHTS in your yard! ;)

PS. I just discovered that if you highlight and copy your text from time to time, you can prevent losing it.

Here is a link that might be useful: my member page at Dave's Garden

Hi Susan, You know it was worse in the spring so I guess I will just have to live with it. I do love those fragrant roses and I guess they do too. haha!

Howdy Miss Terry, Your a sweetie. You know I used to live in Michigan when I was a kid. We moved to Georgia when I was 12. I did love all the snow we used to get though. I will email you real soon. I saw your picture on the knockout post and it was real pretty. Talk to you later!

Hi Nancy, I do hope we can find something to control these little boogers. They are so irritating.

Wow greenthumb, You have really been studying these little creatures. Someone on here mentioned the plastic on another thread for something and it might have been thrips. My brain forgets alot of things lately. I will think about using those glue strips and I definitely will avoid any blue lights too.

Thanks everyone for responding. Take care, Judy

My goodness, I don't think such involved responses have appeared here on any other topic! -- Which illustrates just how troublesome, destructive and maddening these almot microscopic pests are to rosarians everywhere.

I should be the VERY last one to reference holy writ in any context (believe me), but I shall anyway . . . Refer to St. Matthew 26:11 and/or St. John 12:8 and substitute 'thrips' for 'the poor'.

It's hopeless. When it comes to thrips, just offer 'em up. What else can one do?

Jax, I feel the exact same way about JBs. I have already commenced my battle plans for June '09 and its only January. It's always something, isn't it?
-terry

Thirps are now worse than JBs in my yard. The last two years I haven't had that many JBs. But thirips? I don't think I had them until 2006. Last year was worse. I'm considering doing the paper cups or some beneficial insects.

This is a catalog I received last year that has a lot of organic solutions.

Link

Buford, Have you every used any of the insects on that link? If so which ones and how did they do? Last year we had a whole lot less japanese beetles too. I would love to go that way since I would love to cut down on my spraying due to my sisters pond nearby. Judy

There is a natural alternative called 'Milky Spore' that acts on grubs in the lawn. It should take care of Japanese Beetles. I THINK it is something that can become established in your soil and work for years. Although it's expensive,it may be worth it to you. It's easy to find. I know I've seen it at Lowe's and/or Walmart. (Just make sure it has been stored properly-at our Lowe's they store Neem outside year round and, according to storage directions on the label, that probably ruins it.) Here's a link for info http://homeharvest.com/milkyspore.htm
I hate those beastly beetles too! I've been dive bombed by them. I'm sure you have too. From time to time in the winter, a large flock of starlings (I think) descends on my backyard and spends the day there eating something. Since I don't have many of the beetles, I've figured that's what it was.
I read something interesting about JB pheremone traps. Apparently they attract males and females from 1/4 mile radius. They say that, although you catch many, many others will meet and breed in your yard. It gave me an idea--If you know of some brushy/waste area within 1/4 mile of your house, why not hang a trap or 2 there to draw them out of your yard?

I hate to depress those hopes of gardening thrip-free, but...they are windborne.We live near the shore and thrip will bite you on the beach when they are about. Worse still (in the very olden days) they would arrive in diapers drying outside (yes, Virginia, there was a time before disposables).
I've sprayed in the last two years in absolute desperation, but it doesn't work. They blow in.
Can anyone cheer me with an ecological explanation? Are they feed for anything? Do they serve any purpose at all?

Sue

I had another thought about your original question. I don't know if you are growing the roses to sell or show, or just for your viewing pleasure. If you don't mind them being covered up, you could use a 'floating row cover' fabric to keep adult thrips out.

Here is a link that might be useful: U.C. Davis thrips info

petals, I haven't tried them yet. I'm going to try them this fall. And the traps.

IME, the weather has a lot to do with thrips. Last two years we've had cold wet springs and it took awhile to heat up. I think once it gets hot and a bit dryer, the thrips don't do as well. Or the buds open faster and get less damaged by the thrips. I'm not sure of the reasons, but it seems that way to me.

sue: adults of the Western Flower Thrips eat spider mites.

There is a species of thrips that has been spreading throughout coastal California in the last few years and there is a new species ravaging the Southeast (Chili Thrips). They are still learning about its habits. They think it blew in with a hurricane.
I haven't been able to find out what adults of other species (than the WFTs) eat, but if they eat mites too, then they might actually be a Godsend. We have Broad Mites now in the Southeast and they are invisible and very destructive too. They are very similar to thrips in their preferences and damage. One can only hope . . .