I am getting ready to put elephant ears in the garden room and I want to grow them this winter, but I noticed spider mites so now what do I do? HELP....
Joyce
Help..spider mites on elephant ears
My experience is that they need to go dormant for best growth next spring. If you must try to keep them growing, and you think you have spider mites (I've never heard of ee's getting spider mites) spray them with one part baby shampoo to ten parts water, both sides of the leaves, stems and soil - every week for three weeks.
Some of the ee's are so small, can they go dormant if they just have a couple of leaves? That would be the easiest solution but I didn't figure they were big enough.
Joyce
I keep mine growing all year here in Iowa. The largest ones don't really grow, but they remain green. I have had mites on my little ones in the past and generally just put them in the sink and spray with water. Miticides work too, but many of them smell to bad to use in the house. Something else you can do to get rid of a lot of them is to take a wet paper towel and wipe the leaves and stems.
I dipped them in a bucket of soapy water and will continue that process for awhile. I have two big beautiful ee's can't remember the names but one is really big, stands erect and has heart shaped leaves and I love them! I can't imagine letting them dry up! So I will see if I can pull this off. I started out with one normal ee from wally world and now I have 14 different ee's and that is in 1 year....looks like another addiction! LOL
I've had trouble getting them off my EE's the last few winters. But an insecticidal soap should work for EE's. The fleshy material allows the mites to do damage pretty quick as I'm sure you've seen.
I do agree with the others who say to let them go dormant though. I have seen MUCH better growth in the spring when I either cut mine back or let them die back. When I tried to keep them alive, they were slow to get started in the spring, were very leggy and would collapse over eventually or just didn't look as nice the next year. In fact, of all the EE I've winterized, only one of my Alocasia looked good. I'd just cut them back or let them die back. I think you'll have better results in the spring. Plus, it gets rid of the spider mites.
I'm getting ready for the RSM (red spider mite) attack as I've got a load of plants sheltering indoors over winter. I've tried loads of different ways to tackle them, but not very succesfully.
This time, I'm going for the neem oil. Apparently, it upsets the mites hormones and behaviour which leads to their demise.
Here's some info on how to use it for mites: http://www.discover-neem-oil.com/neem-oil-insecticide.html
Does anyone here use neem oil spray?
I've used it, seems to work fine but honestly I've had just as good luck washing them off the plant with a garden hose. I suppose indoors that becomes less of an option though! All my spider mite problems have been outdoors.
I had been keeping them in the garage away from my other plants, but today while I was at work my husband helped me out and moved them to my garden room with all my other plants....gotta love 'em...I think I have them under control with soap and water course winter is just starting. Thanks everyone for you help. These ee's only have 2 or 3 leaves and just don't look big enough to let go dormant....does anyone have an opinion on the size of them? Dormant would be easier.
Safer's End-All Miticide worked well on my spider mites this year. The little buggers are history.
It contains a very low concentration of pyrethrins. I'm mildly allergic to them, but this was so mild (around half a percent) I could barely smell it, and I had absolutely no reaction. I used it on a trachy fortuneii, a jasminum officionale, a cat palm (the prime offender), a hedychium coronarium (ginger lily), a bougainvillea, and a jasminum nitidum. None of those plants had a problem with it.
Your mileage may vary. I've heard great things about neem oil, but I've never used it.
-Joe
I have had my first spider mite experience (yay!, I hate bugs..lol), and I used the neem concentrate from Lowe's. I mixed it with almost hot water and some soap. It seems to be working so far, I spray again tommorrow. I noticed none of the bad smell I've heard about with neem, but it seems like it has some citrus oil or something, doesn't smell bad like I've heard with the oil, but this is the concentrate. I have really sensitive skin, too, but this didn't bother me.
I've been pretty aggressive, I washed down all the leaves really well before spraying with neem, hacked off any leaves that looked bad...some things are hardly nubs, and even repotted a few things. I read that misting daily helps, so I always add a little soap to my misting water, too. So far it's working, but it's only been a week.....I'll try and update again tommorrow after I spray and give everything a closer look