Aphids, HELP ME!

Just bought cans of ortho rose pride.
have about 60 david austin roses. well on their way to 20 blooms each.
noticed infestation of aphids. resistant to Seven, two applications.
read the FDA stuff on this Rose pride, what else can i use that is not , i mean absolutely non carcinogenic and will Kill those nasty green aphids.
Help.
also i have a grandkid who i dont want to be around neurotoxic stuff.
can anyone suggest anything?

A strong spray of water, and then squoosh the remaining with your gloved fiingers

FlowAjen has given excellent advice. Get yourself a watering wand with a rose end and direct a strongish spray of water up from underneath the branches daily... this is extremely good general advice for other rose problems too, including black spot, as it washes off fungal spores.

Another thing... insect infestations are often associated with a plant that has already been stressed in some way, often by lack of sufficient water.

This message was edited May 16, 2012 9:38 AM

Blast of water always works for me

I always go with the water blast too (you will need to keep an eye out every couple days for a while though--if you miss one they reproduce at the speed of light). If you want to use a less toxic chemical, insecticidal soap is a very good option (again you will probably need to repeat). Aphids are easy to kill but hard to get rid of...they have soft bodies which are easy to squish or to dessicate with the soap, but since they reproduce so quickly if you miss even a couple and don't stay on top of it until you're sure they're all gone, your infestation will come right back.

Ladybugs? I don't have them -yet, but that's my plan if I get them. Since I have milkweed and roses it's kind of a given for me I think and I can't use insecticides since I want the butterflies to use the milkweed. This is my first year having the milkweed and I never had an aphid problem before, but if I develop one that's what I'm doing. 1500 ladybugs for about 18.00 from what I've seen.

I already have lots of ladybugs and lacewings so I'm hoping I won't need to, but I won't hesitate.

I use a few drops of washing up liquid added to a pint of water and mist this onto the roses or any other plants that are infested by green / white / or black fly, there is a very small amount of oil added to this soap (to keep our hands soft with so much washing up) this oil helps prevent the Aphids breathing as it coats their skin, therefore they cant bread /lay eggs, I find this method works better if done in the daytime and then I use the hose in the evening.
Remember you need to mist / spray the underside of the leaves as this is where the Aphids lay there millions of eggs the size of a pin head.
Right now I have the same trouble with one of my standard Fuchias that I saved over winter in my greenhouse and it is covered, yesterday I went over it like a fine tooth comb and squashed (gentley) as many of those bugs as I could between finger and thumb, then misted with the dish soap mix and this morning put the plant outside and used the garden hose, the plant looks wonderful again but I will have to do a repeat 2 days from now so dont think it will be a quick fix, but it's worth it, chemicles do the job but like the soap method, you have to keep using them and who wants that.
Good luck, go get em and stand proud, ha, ha, ha.
WeeNel.