Spider Mites Contnued... Questionf for when in Flowering...

So barely into flowering, little tiny flowers starting to firm up and look nice.

I've done a home-remedy spray based on Neem Oil and Garlic, Cayene Pepper, Dish Soap and Alcohol.
Followed that 2 days later with Organocide (boy does that shit stink).
On both times I gave them a good dousing, working on each plant individually ensuring bottom of leaves got soaked.

Today I inspected a leaf and I can still find a few moving about slowly. Does this mean both treatments were totally ineffective or just a few tough mo-fo's made it through?

I sprayed some more of my home-brew remedy that I had left over and I've got some more in the jug I can load up in my sprayer... How many days should I wait and what is
a good way of measuring whether or not I need to step it up to a tougher fight with harsher chemicals - or more concentrated of an organic...

What can be done so that I'm not harvesting a load of chemicals at the end? What are the safe thresholds (# of days from harvest) for the various options?

Count me in for the "I F'ing hate bugs!" club....

Also, can you use lady bugs in a small indoor area? Any health risks to people or pets?

Same for these 'predatory mites' - how are these techniques used in an indoors/home environment?

Anyone? I think I've got some of it controlled with what I've done so far, but would really like clarification on how to handle them when in the flower cycle.

I beleive DoktorDoom room fogger is organic made from Chrysanthemums, and safe til a day before harvest supposedly. I think you are supposed to use it like 3 times in 4 day intervals for irradication. 1 bomb could kill the live ones and control populations at least for you. I think the key is to switch up your treatments, next time use something else. I seem to be on my way to knocking out a new mite problem in veg, and plan to use a couple of these bombs as a suppliment to my other things. As a preventative, I plan to do a 4 month treament plan, Floramite, Forbid, and Avid, each 30 days apart, with the 30 day break before harvest. These are really expensive, but you can buy small dose concentrates on eBay that would make like 15 gallons total. If I see even something that looks like a mite, I'll run the cycle again. I already have a respirator and hazmat coverall suit on the way .

I've had decent results with SNS217 spray. But i also had a huge breakout during flower on my first grow and tried and it couldnt keep up. It also could have been me not treating the problem like i was supposed to. But i still vouch for it,using it now on my veging plants and no devilbugs as we speak.


ITS ORGANIC ALSO. I have forbid and another heavy hitter but those things are rough and would't result to using them unless sumn drastic happens. I bought the forbid and (i forgot the other name) on a reccomendation then googled the stuff and its some pretty harsh stuff. Even says not to use on ingested things.

I think what would help just as much for others in the future, myself included, would be to maybe detail/list out WHAT NOT TO DO! The community here has that knowledge...

I.e. you walk into the local hydro or gardening center and see a half-dozen or so common products. Of these common options, which ones specifically should NOT be done during Flower and more so... how long before harvest it can be used - if at all - during flower....

Also - any home remedies that should NOT be used...

etc...

Such lists are out there, but everyone has different opinions. There are also 1000s of mite strains, and they can have varying levels of resistances. I've heard people able to irradicate a problem with a organic foliar spray, and know people who can't beat it with commercial often illegal super stong chemicals. I personally like the multi-pronged attack, and look for like the top 3 options, and do all of them. The real key is to rotate between multiple treatment options to stay ahead of resistances, and also do any non systemic treatment multiple times over the course of 2-3 weeks to get ahead of the reproductive cycle.

Items I do like:
Organics:

Mighty Wash
Neem and various other oil treatments.
Azamax
Doktor Doom

Chems:
My #1 choice for ease of use and effectiveness.
HotShot pest strips (these rock if your mites aren't immune. Make sure to change them way more often than reccomended, because too small of dosage can help them build a resistance.) Probably also only want to have them out for the 2 weeks of treatment, and I use double the amount than they are labeled for the space. They are probably pretty bad to breathe in. I've read the government report on it, and as far as poison in the air is concerned, its actually didn't scare me that much. But this is definitely not using them as labeled. Also you can't vent the room while these are in, at most you can run a cycle a couple times a day, but to be effective the chemical has to build up in the room. I still use my circulating fans, in fact i use them to blow directly on the strip I think that helps. I've even hung the strip directly on a fan before. Within 24 hours, I could not find any moving mites searching with a scope over an hour time. I've heard mixed reviews about using these in late flower, it's my understanding the chemical type is not one that is absorbed by the plants, though I've not seen scientific proof. People have reported using these through harvest with no adverse flavor effects. I try to avoid long periods in my room while these are up, however sometimes I can't avoid it and have spent hours at a time with them with no immeidate effects. I'm more concerned about my dog upstairs. I have heard reports of skin and breathing irritation, but have not noticed this myself.

Each of these are 30ish day sprays. They are considered Contact treatments, however have systemic action. All do similar things with different active ingredients, rotations on a monthly basis or so can help stay ahead of mite resistances. I would avoid these a month before or more before harvest. All are quite strong and good choices if you are trying to completely irradicate a problem. All illegal in California I believe.
Avid
Floromite
Forbid

NewGrower2011 said:

I think what would help just as much for others in the future, myself included, would be to maybe detail/list out WHAT NOT TO DO! The community here has that knowledge...

I.e. you walk into the local hydro or gardening center and see a half-dozen or so common products. Of these common options, which ones specifically should NOT be done during Flower and more so... how long before harvest it can be used - if at all - during flower....

Also - any home remedies that should NOT be used...

etc...

Click to expand...

No pest strips are wonderful in a closed small environment, but experience with the borg has shown the only way to truly eliminate them is to eliminate the food source, sterilize, and start again. That said, as ugly as they can get and damage done, you'll still get a harvest, and webs can be cut off, while hanging branches to dry causes the mites to congregate at the new "tops'' (cut portion of stems) and die a slow and hopefully agonizing death. Be wary of spraying or fogging after the formation of flowers for two reasons; residual effect and (worse) mold and mildew (pythium). The plague (pythium) is every bit as horrible and difficult to eradicate as the borg (spider mites).

Getting to the point of webs is in my opinion way too late. Either your population got WAY ahead of you either through immunities or ineffective treatment options, or you didn't catch it in time. If you have ever seen a mite in your grow, I would regularly be inspecting any leaf with any kind of damage with a scope, as well as just regularly inspecting leaf bottoms at random. Well before the stage of getting webs, signs of eggs on leaves is unmistakable, and usually widespread well before that point.

I do really like less harsh contact options, such as soap dips and saturating sprays, but in my opinion, its too impractical in large bushy plants to really get full coverage on the bottoms of all the leaves if you are growing alot of them.

It's easy for them to get way ahead, and once resistant, nearly impossible to eliminate. Sometime you have no choice to to play the hand you're dealt and hope for the best

I got rid of them with murphys oil soap the last time. look at spidermite death a few threads back. mighty wash will work in flower and hot shot no pest strips work good just hang them an a fan and let it blow around in the room. I did a 9 by 10 room with 4 hot shot strips. aza max works good just mix it strong they say only use so much because of liability reasons.

If I get mites in my Veg area I can completely eliminate them with this not so scientific technique taught to me by my teacher.

Take the veg plants and spray all of them with neem oil or pyrethrum based insecticide top to bottom. For each of the next six days take the plants and hose them down with water in a sink or shower to physically remove all of the eggs and webbing from the plants. Washing them with water in this way will damage the foliage but the plants will quickly recover. After washing them with water for six days re apply an insecticide, continue to wash the plants with water afterwards for another six days and you should be in the clear.

Obviously this won't work in flowering but you can at least prevent constant reinfestations people complain of.

Also don't use anything with spinosad in it, it is fairly effective but the mites that do survive are nearly immune to any treatment. "May god have mercy on us all spider mites"

quite informative Thank you as this was quite helpfull! jack

Yeah Asa ax is good. Mix it with very cold water, it makes them lose their grip.

If your baby's are already on 12/12 even at the very beginning of flower AVOID ANY CHEMICALS use a product like liquid lady bug (or similar) to complete this flowering stage. You will need a few spray session to limit the damage to your plants, you can use liquid lady bug up to the very last day . 5 Days to a week into veg of your next use Floramite ( Hexygon & Forbid work too ) Do it even if you don't see any mites at this point & spray again a week later. The chemicals will have plenty of time diapered & the pest will be eradicated.

Home made Liquid lady bug : Use 1L of steam water add 4ml of Organic Peppermint Oil, 3ml Organic Geranium oil, 1ml citric acid and a drop of organic soap.
Alternate : Use 1L of steam water add 3ml Organic Lemongrass oil, 2ml Organic Geranium oil, 2ml Organic Garlic extract and a drop of organic soap.

Some Hydro-shop will sell Floramite in pre-mesure dose. It's way more affordable than the 300 $ a full bottle cost. I bought mine in 50ml bottle on ebay.

Now that you have them in your grow I'd suggest going to a preventitive anti-mite way of thinking as soon as you get your infestation under control. Get rid of em and make sure they dint come back

I took every plant outside and washed w/ a hose. Let them dry with fans and then treated w/ Neem. Next day Docdoom. Then Neem every other day. You also really wanna hit your grow area w/ a fogger while you're rinsing the plants outside or in a shower

I have a perpetual grow w/ 4 separate rooms areas. I treat with Neem and dish soap every 4 days. Every 2 weeks they get DocDoom. I

This thread is old, and theres constantly new threads about this, but I had previously posted here, but an update on my mite treatments anyway. I had mites again several months later, 2 spotted mites again, however the hotshot strips were having no effect this time arround. Probably got immune mites from a different place, or bred tolerant mites in my own place. I was using very little other methods other than the hot shots which is a pretty big no-no in hind-sight. Basically what happens is if you use only 1 chemical, a couple mites may be immune, so they continue to survive, and reproduce passing on the genetics of immunity, so you end up with a bunch of mites that are immune to the chemical you are using. I now prefer a multi-pronged attack, and have completely abandoned hotshot nps because I'm a little paranoid about what it is leaving in the air. My new thing now is an Atomizer Sprayer. I've tried the sprayers from Home Depot and stuff, and for small grows are probably ok, but are not very efficient at all. It cant atomize the liquid enough and causes alot of over spray and waste. For bug problems in anything bigger than a small closet grow I highly reccomend this: http://www.amazon.com/Hudson-99598-Electric-Atomizer-Sprayer/dp/B001FWX3LK/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360254548&sr=8-1&keywords=hudson+fog+sprayer.

This this efficiently sprays the leaves, and allows me to use like 1/3 the product I was once using. Things like mighty wash at $100 for the big bottle add up quick. Now I rotate between mighty wash and 2 other mostly organic insecticidal soaps. Its done so quickly and effectively that it crushed my might problem seemingly completely. When I want to make a run at knocking these fuckers out, i do a rotation of treatments once every 3-4 days for 3 weeks. I'll also occasionally throw a permethrin bomb into rotation. I get one from home depot that doesnt use flammable propellants because i'm super paranoid about explosions and stuff. Since squashing my problem I've just finished an 8 week run without seeing a single mite. If they do show up again, i'm confident I can easily deal with it without using the really harsh commercial poisons and its easy with the new sprayer. If you are using anything poisonous in this thing i highly reccomend a very high quality mask. This thing atomizes the product into tiny particles, probably very breathable, but gives such reliable coverage to all parts of your plant.