Flower Gardening?

[thaisomchai]

Am I the only one here with a flower garden? I am surprised to find that there is no specific forum and apparently very little interest in this topic.

This forum is mostly about dogs . .the farming forum seems to revolve around pigs and chickens and planting rice in the north 40.

I have a gardening question about those little white aphids (?) which afflict my hibiscus plants.

Asking local Thai gardeners has gotten me nowhere.

"What little white aphids?" is the usual reply. When I show them the bugs, I get a lovely smile and a tolerant "These farangs are so fussy look."

Only advice I have gotten was to spray the plant with water. Doesnt work.

We have a magnificent golden hibiscus ( two in fact) and out of 20 or so buds only ONE made it through the infestation of these little white pests.

The buds drop off waaay early and the whole stem and the underside of the leaves are covered with a white webby stuff. It is a shame because these are beautiful plants after all.

I have tried applying a malathion solution with a mister. Beside smelling up the entire garden, the hibiscus plants seem to hate the stuff and the leaves shrivel and wrinkle . .and the aphids are back in no time. They LOVE it.

What does work is picking them off by hand and squashing them . .but as far as daily tasks go, this is neither pleasant nor sustainable . .we have several hibiscus plants of various sizes . .some quite large.

So what to do? Open to suggestions here from any fellow gardeners.

[nidge]

I have a flower garden and i also suffer with aphids on my 2 of my hibiscus. Curiously the other 2 are untouched. I bought an "organic" aphid killer from homepro. It was the only thing they had and it smelt really bad. Works as well as water. The most successful method i have tried is soapy water. Mix some dish soap or hand soap into water and spray it. Also after you have washed the car, (assuming you have one), pour the soapy water over your plants.

If you find a better solution let me know. i'd love to try something more successful.

Nidge.

[Lite Beer]

An Off Topic Nonsensical Post has been deleted.

[thaisomchai]

Thanks Nidge!

I had not tried soapy water.. . .I will do that tomorrow. Thanks! I am assuming that it doesnt harm the plants at all . .even in the soil?

You probably had the malathion . .it DOES smell bad and is banned in many countries . ..I am extremely careful with it.

The little devils do seem to skip around . .. sometimes the whole plant will seem aphid free . .and then I will find one branch to be covered with them. Kind of a hatchery or training camp. I am going to do some more checking online.

 I will be happy to post the results . .and thanks admin for straightening out the thread!

Edited July 24, 2011 by thaisomchai

[opalhort]

I have a gardening question about those little white aphids (?) which afflict my hibiscus plants

We have the same problem with the plants we export One aphis found in a EU or US bound shipment and all plants will be destroyed. Particularly Hibiscus and Plumeria appear to be tasty for the bugs.

We use a variety of chemicals, whatever is currently in our stock.

I suggest you do a Google for aphis control - lots of info there. Most chemicals are available at the shops outside the Chatuchak market in BKK.

Strong water spray is also OK but only if you can find them all and the infestation is not widespread.

[nidge]

The soapy water does no harm to the plants or soil, i have used this method for about 25 years. It worked very well in England but it's less successful for me here. The aphids are much bigger and move a lot faster. They only seem to affect the buds though.

Do you have any problems with roses? Mine sometimes flower really well, other times the flowers are small and scruffy, it's really annoying.

[thaisomchai]

Thanks opalhort!

The problem I have had buying chemicals for pest control . . .the labels are all in Thai.

I know the Malathion only because of its smell which I was very familiar with in Central America.

But spraying it even diluted seems to cause the leaves to wrinkle up. And once they are on or near a bud, that's it. No flower.

So the spraying seems to be best done before the aphids appear. ??

How do these things get around anyway? There must be a flying stage?

Edited July 24, 2011 by thaisomchai

[thaisomchai]

Nidge . .no such trouble with the roses . .and we have about a half dozen plants in full bloom right now . .except for something eating neat circles out of some of the leaves. Doesnt seem to affect the blossoms or plant health so I havent worried about it. We havent yet been able to discover the culprit and I dont think it is snails. I am surprised that they are as healthy as they are. The aphids I have also mainly affect the buds, but the leaves will curl up and the whole plant take on a "twisty" look.

[nidge]

The circles in the leaves are probably ants but may be caterpillars. I've also found a few locusts on some well eaten plants recently.

[sbk]

Hi nidge, we've had a few aphid threads over the years, you might consider neem spray.

heres a few threads on neem

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?app=core&module=search&do=search&fromMainBar=1

[fredob43]

Nidge . .no such trouble with the roses . .and we have about a half dozen plants in full bloom right now . .except for something eating neat circles out of some of the leaves. Doesnt seem to affect the blossoms or plant health so I havent worried about it. We havent yet been able to discover the culprit and I dont think it is snails. I am surprised that they are as healthy as they are. The aphids I have also mainly affect the buds, but the leaves will curl up and the whole plant take on a "twisty" look.

We had problem's with our rose's. The G/L went out and got some big garlic clove's pushed a couple into the ground round each rose and within a week all the little bugger's had gone never to return. Dont know if it'll work on Hibiscus but might be worth a try. Best of luck.

[nidge]

Hi nidge, we've had a few aphid threads over the years, you might consider neem spray.

heres a few threads on neem

http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/index.php?app=core&module=search&do=search&fromMainBar=1

Thanks sbk, the link didn't work but i checked neem. There are warnings regarding pregnancy. As my wife is pregnant i'll give that a miss until next year but i will definitely try it then.

I like the garlic idea, i'll try that one tomorrow. Thanks fred.

[seabear]

That works. Got it from my gardener here in Phuket.

[sbk]

ah pregnant wife, best keep all chemicals away. chilis ground up with garlic and some oil and spray the heck out of them

[fredob43]

Hi nidge, we've had a few aphid threads over the years, you might consider neem spray.

heres a few threads on neem

http://www.thaivisa....h&fromMainBar=1

Thanks sbk, the link didn't work but i checked neem. There are warnings regarding pregnancy. As my wife is pregnant i'll give that a miss until next year but i will definitely try it then.

I like the garlic idea, i'll try that one tomorrow. Thanks fred.

If it work's on your Hibiscus let us know please. Oh and big one's not peeled. As an extra you might even get a few garlic bulb's. No complaint's if your Hibiscus flower's smell of Garlic.

[opalhort]

This may not be of much help to nitge now but here is some info regarding pestcontrol:

Everything below was taught us by plant-inspectors of the Department of Agriculture (Kaset).

Since we export plants to the EU we had to register our nursery as being bug and pest

free. This took a year with montly visits by inspectors. After the nursery was found

clean for the last three visits we got the certificate.

Since we buy all plants for export from other growers and the plants are usually small

and infested we have to treat them prior to placing in our nursery.

This is done by taking the plant up-side-down and dipping the entire plant (NOT the

rootball) in 0.2% Imidaclopid for 15 min., keep in a dry place and water only the roots -

do not water the foliage - for one week.

After that water normally and spray the plants from underneath the foliage with

Carbosulfan once a month.

This is suppost to work for all bugs known here.

For long term use we had to place bug glue tags around the nursery (see photos).

These tags are non toxic and can be placed in every garden. You can easily make them

yourself:

Cut YELLOW! (this color attracts most bugs) corugated plastic poster board (not sure

what this is actually called in English) size 4x6" and fix it on a little bamboo stick. This

can be permanent since it never needs to be changed.

Place a clear plastic bag (4½ x 7") and place it over the plastic board, use a staple

(MAX) to hold it in place. Now spread bug glue on both sides of the bag (the glue is

water and sun proof for about a month and can be bought at shops outside

Chatuchak). Replace the bag every 3-4 weeks or when full of bugs.

As for the Hibiscus of nitge you can make some tags just tall enough to fit under the

bush but the yellow tag is just inside the foliage. This way you will not only catch flying

but also some crawling bugs.

The hight of the tag should be about level with the foliage with most plants in the

garden.

Now an inspector shows up every six weeks and weekly if we have a shipment

scheduled. I they find any bug on two subsequent visits our certificate will be revoked.

Our nursery is open air, no greenhouse etc. so it can be quite a tough job if you have a

few thousand plants stored there.

[David006]

so....lets have a pinned flower/flowering tree thread then George!?..or someone.

..my wife is an orchid fanatic... I am a fix 'em plant 'em,pot 'em, weed 'em,fertilize 'em slave.

"deeeaaah!!... I want to have this there and dig up those and cut those ...and here is some mamma/sister/auntie gave me... I(you) want to plant there..can you drill pots to hang there....or maybe there...what you do!!! it only 10:30 and you drink beer already!!"

[sbk]

We can pin, but tbh, alot of people ignore the pinned threads, IME. Maybe just remember that you can post all your flowering questions here? Up to you guys

[bina]

pinned topics are only good for static information (rules and regs). just start a thread like orchids 101 and let it run, revive when needed. it works in the farming section for the pigs 101 and other things. im just not really a plant person so i cant answer much.

youi do know that many lizards love habiscus plants, they are the fave food for turtles also, the flowers have lots of vitamin c ...

our kibbutz is a mostly 'green' kibbutz and detergent (dish detergent) is the main ingerdient in our gardener's anti bug solution since we have pregnant women and tons of toddlers everywhere.

no herbacides are used. fly control is done by using some horrible smelling yeast based bait hung all over the place. med fruitfly traps are also home made i think hormones are used, not sure.

our 2 main beasts of hate are the slug and the snail. the snail is a seasonal problem as they come out with the first rains and go away in the drought season as do the slugs.

bina

israel