Citric acid crystals vs powder for pest treatment

I keep burning my plants to hell using the citric acid crystals I got off amazon which is frustrating because so many reputable growers here recommend it. It's cheap, organic, and I desperately want to get it working for me.

I did a little reading to see if I can figure out why this is happening to my plants but not other growers. I need some input from others using citric acid and what form they're using whether it's crystals or powder. What I discovered is they are not equal. Crystals weigh a lot more than the powder. If I'm supposed to be using powder instead of crystals I'm spraying with citric acid that's far too strong which would explain why my plants are burning while others are using it without a problem.

This is the citric I bought online:

I was reading around forums and someone was discussing the differences between the powder vs crystals in regards to cooking recipes. This person had been using the citric powder in her recipes and picked up citric crystals when it ran out. The flavor of her recipes wasn't the same. She then bought some citric powder and weighed an equal amount of both the citric powder and citric acid. She noticed the crystals weight significantly more which was negatively affecting the flavor of her recipes.

Is my sniffer on the right track here? If so I'll order citric powder and try this again.

jonnynobody said:

I keep burning my plants to hell using the citric acid crystals I got off amazon which is frustrating because so many reputable growers here recommend it. It's cheap, organic, and I desperately want to get it working for me.

I did a little reading to see if I can figure out why this is happening to my plants but not other growers. I need some input from others using citric acid and what form they're using whether it's crystals or powder. What I discovered is they are not equal. Crystals weigh a lot more than the powder. If I'm supposed to be using powder instead of crystals I'm spraying with citric acid that's far too strong which would explain why my plants are burning while others are using it without a problem.

This is the citric I bought online:

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00EYFKKZC/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_image?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I was reading around forums and someone was discussing the differences between the powder vs crystals in regards to cooking recipes. This person had been using the citric powder in her recipes and picked up citric crystals when it ran out. The flavor of her recipes wasn't the same. She then bought some citric powder and weighed an equal amount of both the citric powder and citric acid. She noticed the crystals weight significantly more which was negatively affecting the flavor of her recipes.

Is my sniffer on the right track here? If so I'll order citric powder and try this again.

Click to expand...

I've always used the fine grained crystalized form that looks similar to salt.

Are you adding anything? You don't need to add a surfactant when using citric acid.

xtsho said:

I've always used the fine grained crystalized form that looks similar to salt.

Are you adding anything? You don't need to add a surfactant when using citric acid.

Click to expand...

What concentration of citric do you mix up for bugs?

Star Dog said:

What concentration of citric do you mix up for bugs?

Click to expand...

2tsp/qt. No wetting agent. Tap water.

xtsho said:

I've always used the fine grained crystalized form that looks similar to salt.

Are you adding anything? You don't need to add a surfactant when using citric acid.

Click to expand...

Just citric and tap water. 2tsp/qt. It really shriveled up the foliage top to bottom. Not as bad as a neem oil fry, but it don't look pretty.

I'm trying this recipe tonight on the same plant before I toss it out as an experiment. This is not my recipe. It's something I found on a few general gardening sites. I don't care if it damages the test plant any further but I've learned my lesson spraying a new formula on my whole garden without first testing with tragic consequences. First time I sprayed with neem 10 years ago or so I failed to emulsify it and sprayed my plants. My heart almost fell through my asshole the next day when I opened the tent. Had to toss 'em all. I probably should have followed directions better

1/4 cup Baking Soda
1/2 cup Apple Cider vinegar
1 Tablespoon Lemon Juice
2 drops dish detergent
1/2 tsp espom salt

Take a cup of very hot water and desolve the epsom salts,take rest of ingredients and place in a clean 2 liter bottle and let work out. Add epsom solution. Add water to fill to 48ozs(3/4 full).Shake well.

TO USE: Cover soil/medium with plastic,with lights off mist plant all over,especialy under leaves,
Wait 20 mins,then spritz off with clean fresh water shaking as much water off plant as you can.
The fresh water spritz rinse will remove the solution along with the desolved remains of the mites and their eggs.

Star Dog said:

What concentration of citric do you mix up for bugs?

Click to expand...

I've used 3 tsp per quart without any issues but several people have told me that they had some minor leaf damage at that strength so I don't recommend that ratio anymore. But it did take care of the bugs. 2-2.5 tsp per quart might be better to start out with. I don't know why some have leaf issues and others don't. It does need to be used with the lights off indoors until it dries or outside in the evening after the sun has gone down.

jonnynobody said:

2tsp/qt. No wetting agent. Tap water.


Just citric and tap water. 2tsp/qt. It really shriveled up the foliage top to bottom. Not as bad as a neem oil fry, but it don't look pretty.

I'm trying this recipe tonight on the same plant before I toss it out as an experiment. This is not my recipe. It's something I found on a few general gardening sites. I don't care if it damages the test plant any further but I've learned my lesson spraying a new formula on my whole garden without first testing with tragic consequences. First time I sprayed with neem 10 years ago or so I failed to emulsify it and sprayed my plants. My heart almost fell through my asshole the next day when I opened the tent. Had to toss 'em all. I probably should have followed directions better

1/4 cup Baking Soda
1/2 cup Apple Cider vinegar
1 Tablespoon Lemon Juice
2 drops dish detergent


Take a cup of very hot water and desolve the epsom salts,take rest of ingredients and place in a clean 2 liter bottle and let work out. Add epsom solution. Add water to fill to 48ozs(3/4 full).Shake well.

TO USE: Cover soil/medium with plastic,with lights off mist plant all over,especialy under leaves,
Wait 20 mins,then spritz off with clean fresh water shaking as much water off plant as you can.
The fresh water spritz rinse will remove the solution along with the desolved remains of the mites and their eggs.

Click to expand...

How much Neem are you using to fry plants? I've used it for years and never had any leaf damage except for one time when had a few too many barley pops and used tablespoons instead of teaspoons. That wasn't a pretty sight. I use Sesame oil now though since it performs the same purpose and I keep it on hand for cooking. A little goes a long way.

xtsho said:

I've used 3 tsp per quart without any issues but several people have told me that they had some minor leaf damage at that strength so I don't recommend that ratio anymore. But it did take care of the bugs. 2-2.5 tsp per quart might be better to start out with. I don't know why some have leaf issues and others don't. It does need to be used with the lights off indoors until it dries or outside in the evening after the sun has gone down.

Click to expand...

I didn't have this experience @3tsp/quart. Just a little leaf droop and they snapped out of it in a day. I'm trying to figure this out because it just doesn't make a whole lotta sense. In my flower room where the test plant was sprayed I realized I may have caused the damage. I have an electric oil filled radiator that keeps the room warm. To circulate it I have a small box fan on low behind it pushing the warm air that comes off the radiator. That dam plant was almost directly in the line of fire. No shaking leaves but definitely a good amount of air moving where the plant was. It seems like I've had damage in the past due to not turning my fans off after spraying. Does that sound like a possibility? I'll move the fan and try again if you think that could be what's boning me here.

xtsho said:

How much Neem are you using to fry plants? I've used it for years and never had any leaf damage except for one time when had a few too many barley pops and used tablespoons instead of teaspoons. That wasn't a pretty sight. I use Sesame oil now though since it performs the same purpose and I keep it on hand for cooking. A little goes a long way.

Click to expand...

It was absolutely operator error. It was when I first started growing and I don't even think I used an emulsifier. Apparently following instructions on the bottle is critical to the process

Talk to me about sesame oil. I have some on hand. How do you recommend mixing it?

jonnynobody said:

It was absolutely operator error. It was when I first started growing and I don't even think I used an emulsifier. Apparently following instructions on the bottle is critical to the process

Talk to me about sesame oil. I have some on hand. How do you recommend mixing it?

Click to expand...

Sesame oil is the active ingredient in Organocide 3-In-1. The concentrate is 5% sesame oil and the RTU is 0.8%. I've never used it and according to their directions you use 3 oz per gallon of the concentrate. But those ratios are for the garden, roses, etc... I don't use it at that strength. I use 1/2 tsp per quart on cannabis as a preventative in veg. If you do decide to use it please test it first before using it on your entire crop.

The apple cider vinegar mix I applied to the test plant last night doesn't appear to have caused any damage. Today I applied the wettable bonide brand sulfur @3tbsp/gal. I only sprayed the test plant so far to see if it causes any damage. I'll keep an eye on her until tonight. If all is well I'll sulfur spray the whole flower room.

On another note I for some reason was feeling froggy and busted out the bottle of neem oil again with the dr bronners. In a shot glass I mixed 1tsp neem and 1 tsp bronner's. Filled the shot glass 3/4 full with super hot water then mixed with a liquid measuring syringe. Everything emulsified into a white cloud. I added the mixture to 1 qt warm water in a gallon jug. As soon as the mixture hit the water it just dispersed immediately and went into solution without so much as a single stir with a spoon. I feel like I just discovered fire man. No shit. I've tried to make this stuff work for years and was never able to get the stuff emulsified. I think most others use less bronner's but I've seen quite a few recipes on general gardening forums that call for a 1:1 ratio. I've applied one time in the past with the 1:1 ratio with no damage to the plants. I'll try emulsifying 1tsp neem and 1/2tsp bronner's later. If it works it works. That'll double the length of time the bottle of bronner's will last and I'm okay with that.

If I apply the sulfur tonight to the whole garden I can't apply any type of horticultural oil for 30 days. If the sulfur works to supress the mites I can continue spraying 1x/week up to the 2nd week of flower before flowers beginning developing. I'll switch to spinosad and venerate from there until the chop. Kind of a bummer. I finally get neem to work which is very cool and I can't really use it because I'm trying out the sulfur first. I'll use it religiously on my vegging plants as part of my IPM when they're big enough to handle it. They're only about 10 days above dirt so far. A spritz with water knocks a few over then I have to support 'em with the plant marker.

Anybody know how often I can spray neem without hurting the plants? I hear some guys say they spray every other day and others say no more than 1x/week. It's a bit confusing.

I defoliated the shit outta all the plants over the last 3 days. Dam things are just leaf factories. I did a full defoliation less than 10 days ago. Fuckers bush out quickly. Now all I gotta do is keep these mites from building another population while I treat them thoroughly with 1x/week sulfur sprays for 2 weeks. I can't wait to unload these dam plants. I desperately want them out of my life but they're not bad enough to throw out. Here's a pic of my naked ladies:

That little one in the front left is the test plant.



Neem finally emulsified. I'm pretty sure this is something nobody else is gonna get excited about but this shit is just amazing to me. It seems the key to making the neem emulsify is to mix the soap and neem first. Stir it up until it's a cloud. Then add that to a quart of hot water. Easy peezy. I kept trying to emulsify everything together in the spray bottle. Shit never worked.




This shit stinks to high hell. Kinda like a book of matches right under your nose. Hopefully this is the answer to my mite problems.

So, did it work?

Johiem said:

So, did it work?

Click to expand...

Hell to the motherfuckin no. Tried spraying sulfur. Tried burning sulfur. No matter what I used or tried nothing worked. In my 12 or so years of growing I've never had to trash my plants. I planted 28 new seedlings with something like 15 different strains in what I thought was a sterile area of my basement in a nursery tent. Within 5 days of being above the dirt they all got infected with mites. A couple weeks ago I chopped them all down. I had to trash all of them on top of my vegging plants that were about to go into flower. I lost everything. If anyone I know ever gets broad mites in their garden I'd tell them to trash 'em and cut your losses. I spent somewhere around $600 on a variety of different products and it all ended in failure. I'm sterilizing everything now spraying the room every other day with 15% bleach water. Maybe sulfur works for your average spider mite but so far as I can tell after this experience nothing works on broad mites. I was spraying every other day with 4 different products in rotation and I still ended where I did. If you're battling these things I wish you the best of luck.

I'm fairly certain the eggs were in the ocean forest soil I was using. The first infected plant I had was the only plant I had in that dirt. It infected the rest of the garden. When I planted the new 28 seedlings I used dirt from the same bag of dirt as the first plant that infected my garden. Within less than a week of the seedlings above dirt the leaves all began twisting and after inspecting under a scope they were covered in mite eggs. I tossed the dirt and I'll never use the shit in my garden ever again. All sterilized coco and perlite moving forward.

As a side note the problem wasn't severe until I defoliated the plants. I don't think they were able to handle the shock and fight the mites at the same time. It was all over from there.

jonnynobody said:

I didn't have this experience @3tsp/quart. Just a little leaf droop and they snapped out of it in a day. I'm trying to figure this out because it just doesn't make a whole lotta sense. In my flower room where the test plant was sprayed I realized I may have caused the damage. I have an electric oil filled radiator that keeps the room warm. To circulate it I have a small box fan on low behind it pushing the warm air that comes off the radiator. That dam plant was almost directly in the line of fire. No shaking leaves but definitely a good amount of air moving where the plant was. It seems like I've had damage in the past due to not turning my fans off after spraying. Does that sound like a possibility? I'll move the fan and try again if you think that could be what's boning me here.

Click to expand...

Are you spraying them off with water between applications? I've never used it as a foliar spray so I don't know. That was just a thought. Hey @xtsho , what do you say?