There has been a long standing admonition to not wet a plants leaves because that can encourage some plant diseases to develop. However, recent research has found that spraying your plants leaves can wash off the spores of these plant diseases so they cannot develop into the disease. It is not the getting the leaves wet that is the problem, it is having the leaves not fully dry that is the problem. Even spraying that sharp stream of water to knock Aphids off a plant daily will not promote plant diseases, as long as the leaves dry in a relatively short time.

I have heaps on my plants too Annie, yesterday when I pulled a couple of silver beet leaves to feed to the chooks, I found the three plants covered with them so I put a lot on to a leaf and took then over to the roses, funny that would you believe there were no aphids there, someone is doing their job very well as a couple of weeks ago that used to be the first job of a morning after feeding the chooks I used to go around and squash them all, or rub them off the roses. Now isn't nature wonderful with its little workers...Cheers..MM.

g'day, you will robably find you have the aphids because you have ants, aphids don't need heavy handed approach they can simply be sprayed off the plants with a strong spray from the garden hose, or spray them with soapy water. i realy wonder at how much damage can aphids realy do to a healthy plant ok the for those roses they may make the flowers look spotty but then how important is that in the bigger picture? or they can create some sooty mould unsightly maybe but not that detrimental citrus fruit full if sooty mould still taste the same, again they can simply be hosed off. but if the ants are there then you need to move the ants on or the aphid issue will persist. another way is if they are on trees/shrubs like citrus or roses put a smear of vaseline around the trunk to stop the ants walking up the trunk, be sure that no other part of the plant touches anywhere else that the ants can make alternative route to bypass the vaseline. len Here is a link that might be useful: len's garden page

The aphids seem to be flying in from outside. All the time I keep finding full-grown winged aphids on the plants where I know for sure they weren't there the day before. Either that or the ants are bringing them in. There is a close relationship between the two, but I'm not sure whether ants farm the aphids or just turn up to the new foodsource when the aphids proliferate. Last year at the end of the season (feb-mar) a high proportion of the aphids were parasitised by little wasps, but there is no sign of them yet this year. If I could encourage the wasps they might keep the aphids under control. Cheers! Manuel