Hi Ted, thank you for the compliment, I am afraid I have gotten a bit carried away with desert rose plants. I have never had spider mites on DR before. No that is not a dog it is a solar cat statue in my pet cemetary,my last dog passed away 3 weeks ago she was 16 yrs old. Hi Marie, Thank you for liking my collection, it is all your fault LOL! I see all of your beautiful plants and I want more, I want mine to look like yours someday! Brian, Thank you very much for the recipe I will be trying it as well, I believe it will smother them. I have used Imidacloprid granuals in the pots but not the spray, so far I think it helps with the mealy bugs but not spider mites.

I agree that it is not venomous. I had never seen a black widow until a few years ago. This is in spite of the fact that there are lots of them in Florida. I knew at once that this was not the ordinary spider. it has a large bulbous body that looks like patent leather. I caught it in a jar to check the underside and sure enought there was the red hourglass. Needless to say I destroyed it. I have never seen the recluse even though they are prominent here. Most of these spiders do not run around the house or outdoors. They try to stay hidden in dark spaces. If you are gardening, wear gloves.

Hi, I'm far from being a pro at this but I live in the Bay Area and have the same temp drops sometimes. I was told to pull the plants in when temps drop to the low 40s but the nursery in Hawaii where I shipped one home from said to pull them in below the 50s! So far they have withstood a few low 40s nights but I don't have any flowers yet. Three of mine are rooted and 5 are cuttings I started in late June. I do have buds on one of the rooted plants, but because of the fog layer in the morning and not a whole lot of heat this summer (I'm assuming here) they are yet to bloom. And the two I bought at a local nursery here have spider mites too. Wrinkled leaves and little webs, etc. I have sprayed them once and will spray them again a week later with a mild insecticidal soap (made for all kinds of plants including veggies). I have also been spraying them with water under the leaves, but it's no jet spray, just set on shower. Hope this helps, someone more knowledgeable may come along and say something completely opposite, but this seems to be working so far anyway. Good luck, Leslie

1. If you have nearly baseball sized spuds already you can pick them anytime and eat them. So no they are not ruined, unless you were hoping for giant baking potatoes. I would start picking them as you need them and use them as new potatoes. 2. I have only used systemics for spider mites as my problems were on ornamental plants. You don't want to use those for edibles. Oils or soaps should help to control them, just be sure to read the lable to make sure potatoes are listed on it, and if there is a waiting period before eating them, be sure to follow it. 2a. Yes potatoes from a non-organic supermarket are loaded with stuff. Potatoes are one of the most chemically sprayed crops there is. BUT.. they are never harvested until after the "safe" date when the chemicals are supposed to be gone from the plants system. 3. Yes row covers should help, and more active spraying them with water during the hot dry periods. Just peek under those row covers now and again to make sure something didn't get in under them.