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Cacti & Succulents Integrated Pest Management Garden

spider mites augh

5 months ago

I've got spider mites (and at least one katydid) in a bunch of my courtyard potted plants. They're eating holes in the flowers and leaves, and I'm pretty sure they're destroying my succulents, too. I've tried neem oil with very limited success. My garden store suggested powdered sulfur, added to water with a little peppermint soap and then sprayed everywhere. I need to wait another week or so until I'm sure all the neem oil is gone; and in the meantime, I have a few questions that I'm hoping someone here can help me with.

1. I'm trying to figure out proportions of powder:water for succulents, ornamentals, and herbs, with zero success. These plants are not specified on the label instructions; and I've emailed Bonide but haven't heard back. Anyone know?

2. Is sulfur safe to use on things you eat? The mites are wreaking havoc in my thyme, and I'm pretty sure they're in my tomatoes, too. :P

I'm in CA, the Bay Area. Thank you for any help!!

Thyme is sad; bougainvillea is sad.

Calibrochoa -- this used to be covered in flowers, and the spider mites (and/or aphids) are taking over. AUGH.

Cyclamen is sad (theme???); princess plant -- IDK what's going on with that diva, but she's all legs.

Decimated curly jade; struggling jade; very droopy leatherpetal -- I probably should thin it but I think the spider mites also got it

Sulfur with supremely-unhelpful-to-me instructions on the inner label

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Comments (8)

gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
5 months ago
Have you confirmed the presence of spider mites? Any webbing evident? Spider mites (and aphids) are sucking insects - they do not make visible holes. btw, neem oil is registered as a miticide and should be effective, although could well require repeat applications. Sulfur and whatever plant oil you choose to mix with it are not and will have limited effectiveness, if any.
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Emily R.
Original Author
5 months ago
Thank you! I've seen the webs, and the spiders. :/ I've also seen aphids.
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You won't find spider mites OR beneficial predatory mites in your worm bin. The beneficials predate on spider mites, which will only be found on green plants. You have some sort of worm bin mite, about which know pretty much nothing. BUT with one click into Google using 'worm bin mites', I found you a bunch of articles to read. Click on google images first to see the duplicate of your picture. Which was excellent, by the way. By the way, there are many, many species of mites and they are found in all kinds of habitats. Each tend to be very habitat specific, meaning that you can often come pretty close to identifying them by observing where they reside. Here is a link that might be useful: Worm Bin Mites
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Thanks, jean001. It seems someone else posted about the exact same thing within minutes of my post. Also from NJ. Guess the little ones are particularly active here now. What do clover mites do? All the info I've found since reading about them here says they are a nuisance. But not much about them. I do the helpline at the cooperative extension and I'll bet I'll get a question about this.
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Do you live next door? The SAME thing is happening to my tomatoes! I was blaming birds first of all, and then went out to go put out bird netting and found 1 caterpillar and a BUNCH of stinkbugs. They were all on my zucchini or squash plants and I tried to kill as many as possible and then just gave up, ripped the plants up and then burned them. That made me feel better :) I also am fighting spider mites. AUGH! I hope someone can tell us what this is and what to do about it! Here is a link that might be useful: Oh the carnage!
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Steve, I think that's what they call a Velvet Ant, it's a wingless wasp. Spider Mites don't have stingers, and even if they did they're way too small to penetrate human skin. They have mouth parts similar to regular spiders but use them to rasp the surface of the plant and then they suck up the juices. The tiny stipple spots are where they've scratched and sucked up the plant juice. A close up of the Two Spotted Spider Mite. This is a common one, but they're many kinds. And how they look to the naked eye, up close. You can see the fine webbing with mites crawling on it. They're the tiny dots. It does look fairly different than regular spider webs. And here you can see the stipple spotted damage on a leaf; This is a pretty bad case on a lemon tree. The webbing, the tiny mites and the stippling can all be seen here. If you click on the pics, most will show it as a larger picture.
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gardengal48 (PNW Z8/9)
5 months ago
Mites are not spiders and they are almost invisible to the naked eye they are so tiny. Impossible to see on the actual plant. Aphids are a good 5-10 times the size of spider mites. Also, their webbing does not look like a spider's webbing. It is a dense, fluffy substance located under the leaves and in stem joints.

You need to make sure your diagnosis is correct before you apply anything.
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gardenfanatic2003
5 months ago
Don't mix oil and sulphur; it will burn your plants. Yes, it can be used on edibles. Don't know the answer to your question about dilution rate. I've always used Fertilome sulphur and it might be different.
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gardenfanatic2003
5 months ago
You might ask this on the Hoya forum. I know many Hoya growers had to spray their plants with sulfur for flat mites.
floral_uk z.8/9 SW UK
5 months ago
last modified: 5 months ago
If you can see actual spider webs they are not spider mites. And true spiders don't make holes in plants. They eat the things that make holes in plants. You need to id the problem before attempting treatment.

Sulphur is a fungicide, not an insecticide.

If you could post in-focus close ups of what you think is wrong perhaps the problems can be diagnosed. Some of the issues look more cultural than pest ie soil, feeding, watering and pruning.
Emily R.
Original Author
5 months ago
last modified: 5 months ago
Sorry; I've been out of town! Here are some close-up pics of the webs (olive, thyme, succulent), and some of the droppings (?) (not from spider mites obv) on my calibrochoa.
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Emily R.
Original Author
5 months ago
ETA: Problems definitely could be cultural rather than insects, mites, whatever! I'm not a great gardener. :P
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