It would be really strange to me to see that many spider mites on outdoor plants after abundant rain fall- are you certain that's what you are seeing?

Got a photo?

are you sure it is spider mites, that does not sound typicall,

as well that they attack perennials growing in regular soil...

First pic is japanese mint, then shiso, then platycodon. These are just few of the many else affected. The first 2 are in ground and platycodon is a potted seedling. If you look closely(from a computer) you can see white speckles. I check the undersides and they are not aphids, scales, nor mealybugs. I see tiny white on it and I’m pretty sure they are spider mites.

I think it is much more likely to be something like thrips rather than spider mites. Spider mites do not like wet weather or high humidity conditions - they prefer it hot and dry. And there should be discernable webbing present if they were mites. I also have never found spider mites to be "equal opportunity" pests :-) IME, they tend not to colonize a wide array of plants but have their favored species. OTOH, thrips can infest anything growing.

Captain Jack's Dead Bug Brew is an effective control and safe for use with edibles.

That’s what I thought too since I know they are host specific depending on the species of mite so I was confused why they would do that but I do notice that plants I have in the lamiaceae family are affected more. I haven’t seen a single thrip this year. Do they usually come and go? I see many whitish exposed dots on the backside of foliage which are scrapeable with my fingers, are they eggs of the thrips? Not spider mites?

gal .. do you really see enough damage.. to warrant treatment?

i dont

ken

"gal .. do you really see enough damage.. to warrant treatment?"

No. But then I rarely find a need to treat for anything :-) I tend to garden mostly under the concept of peaceful coexistence (the exception being slugs and snails). If I do treat, it is typically a water spray first with infrequently a follow up of something stronger.

Spider mites are tiny.....rarely visible with the naked eye. And when exposed on a white piece of paper, they appear black or dark brown. Like a small speck of dust or ground pepper. Spider mite eggs are even smaller than the adult mites and translucent. Unless you garden with a 10 power microscope, you will never see them.

Ok so i checked with a magnifying glass, they are definitely spider mites. Had 2 dark dots on it which probably identifies as a 2 spotted spider mite. I let it crawl on my fingers, you can definitely see them even without a magnifying glass, at least with my 27 year old near sighted eyes. Here are 3 pictures showing the mites, one under the leaves and one on my finger. On the leaves there are 2 mites on the upper side of the leaves. Last pic has bunch on it and even some webbing.

They are on every leaf of my japanese mint, shiso, every leaf of all my cucurbit plants(12 in total), spreading to my potted seedlings. And these mites overwinter in the ground so cleaning up died down plant debris in the fall won’t be a good method of prevention for next year. Is my garden doomed for life? Lazy predators don’t seem to be around either.

I notice clover in my lawn is often very stippled from spider mites, and also the goldenrod & mints in the un-mowed areas, but typically don't see any noticeable damage on trees or shrubs (tho occasionally on butterfly bush). They often are worst in hot, dry weather. IIRC, there is a predatory red mite (I can see them occasionally running rapidly along surfaces) that preys on the spider mites and can keep them under control.

I don't see any 2 spotted spider mites in your photos, and I think the webbing you refer to, is actually the tomentose underside of the leaf. Predatory mites are supposed to be attracted to mints. Chill out, the universe is not conspiring against you. Gardens take years to evolve. Enjoy the challenges.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-018-38098-x

I think that there are enough predators outdoors to keep any spider mites in check. One thing though, if you decide to bring any plants inside, and they have spider mites, they can do a lot of damage, with the lack of outdoor predators. It happened to me. Just saying cuz like you are always moving plants in and out. On the other hand, knowing you, you probably nuke everything with pesticides before you bring plants in, but there's always the one little spot that gets missed Lol.

Yea, I just noticed you can’t really see them through pics especially on your phone. But they are absolutely two spotted spider mites for sure. Confirmed through magnifying lens and letting them crawl on my hand. They’ve infested almost every plant in my garden, so there’s no going to be no productive method of control. I found live predatory mites for sale so I’m going to order that and see how it works.

Yes I will absolutely make sure I murder every pest to hell on my tropical plants before I move them inside in the fall. Guess we’ll see how the predatory mites do.. really don’t want my place being an arachnogarden

None of the pictures shows enough damage by anything that I would bother to treat.

Thanks. I hope mother nature does its job. I know that in most situations it does but I have seen severe infestations of mites where webbing was severe and you can see mites on every bit of the webbing. They were widespread on the burning bushes at work, they dropped alot of leaves. So predators obviously weren’t able to keep up with it nor treatments. This is what I most fear, where normally mother nature takes care of things like that, in that particular infestation it wasn’t able to keep up.

Is this a lacewing? I saw somethings hopping in my mints and wasn’t sure if they were beneficial or harmful insect.

Also my tropicals are mainly citrus where they must be outdoors for the growing season for maximum sunlight. Maybe I can leave my cast iron plant inside though. Maybe I really do need to have a greenhouse

Well I just did a paper test on the spider mites for my juniper and spruce. Mites sure were crawling all over the paper whether beneficial or not. This really proves that gardening doesn’t always go by the book as you all say mites shouldn’t be around with all the abundant rainy weather our area has been getting. And others like Deer feasting on my aconitum, rabbits chomping my mint to the ground..

I really don’t get why my garden is so badly infested with everything no matter what. There’s no such thing as coexistence in my garden when everything either has mites or aphids or some other pest(squash borer to name one). If it’s not for that then I get fungal diseases on my plants. Am I the only one really struggling with these gardening obstacles?? I’ve only been gardening for 5 years so I can’t say for sure for other people’s garden conditions but I sure got a struggling garden and it’s hard to take any actions when they are so widespread and my full time job isn’t to treat pests/diseases. All I wanted was a peaceful garden to enjoy and relax but gardening is becoming more stressful than enjoy. I really appreciate all your advices, you guys are always helpful but nothing ever seems to go the way its supposed to and I am getting a little tired of it. How do you experienced gardeners garden for decades without going into stress coma lol. Or maybe I’m just super unlucky

Perhaps because you are relatively new to gardening you are more sensitive to issues that gardeners with decades under their belt tend to ignore or overlook.

Part of it is just experience. You learn over time what plants may be very problematic and either limit or eliminate them. And that includes willful self seeding or aggressive/invasive spreading as well as those plagued by insect problems or diseases. And you learn over time what insects can cause significant damage to plants and others that are more just cosmetic. What diseases are a serious concern and others that can be tolerated. Or easily limited.

Tolerance in gardening - as well as patience - is an acquired skill :-) Nature is not perfect and neither will be a cultivated garden. In fact, because we garden in defiance of nature much of the time, the cultivated garden is likely to be more imperfect.

But that's OK! With time and more experience, you will learn what you can tolerate and what you cannot; what you will go to the effort to prevent or eliminate and what you can ignore in relative safety. Peaceful coexistence with your garden IS achievable......just hang in there. It gets better :-)