Something yucky on my salvia

There are tiny black dots on the stems and in the flowers of Mrs. Henry Duelberg. There are also lots of ants. Any idea of what is going on?

Icky, icky aphids. Use some weak soapy water and wash them off. The little $@^ breed so quick you may need to reapply in a few more days.

The ants are protecting and feeding from the aphids.
http://science.jrank.org/pages/462/Aphids-Ants-aphids.html

Ants and aphids

An intimate, symbiotic relationship exists between ants and aphids. They are often compared to cattle, with the ants acting as protectors and ranchers. What aphids have that ants want is something called honeydew, a sweet substance that is excreted by aphids through their anus and contains surplus sugar from the aphid's diet. Ants protect aphid eggs during the winter, and carry the newly hatched aphids to new host plants, where the aphids feed on the leaves and the ants get a supply of honeydew.

Thanks for the link....yeah, that is yucky!!!
Do you spray it on with a spray bottle?

Sometimes I use a spray bottle, it's about 1 tsp per gallon of water, really I just "eye it". If I find them on a floppy plants, I'll mix a bowl and stick the limbs in it.

Yesterday was a first. I found so many on a sedum growing in a pot that I took the entire plant and swirled the entire thing upside down in a bowl of soapy water.lol

I usually use a plain water rinse off after treatment too.

I also noticed this plant, although blooming, had whitish stuff on it...powdery mildew? I cut off the all the offending stems. Do aphids tend to attack a sickly plant or was it the other way around. The mildew has been around awhile...I hoped it would just go away.

Your plant had a nice bubble bath! I was trying to spray them all off, but my hand was getting tired, so I cut and bagged them. Maybe that wasn't a good idea.

I don't know about mildew, Anna.I'm sure someone else will. Knock on wood,... so far I've never had much problems with mildew or rust this far east.

There are plenty of times I'll cut out a stem or just run my hand over them. It's quick, gross and requires hand washing tho. lol

Is the point of the soapy water to make it hard to come back on the stem. I assume the treatment is not complete unless all aphids are gone. (Water or hand swipe...that is gross, but it's amazing what you'll do to protect your babies)

I think soap is a mild pesticide to soft bodied insects. I know it kills fleas and aphids. There are proably more, just can't think of them.

That relationship between aphids and ants, it's only fire ants isn't it? That's what I heard anyway.

I don't think the soap acts as a pesticide, I think it coats and suffocates them. Some of the soft bodied pests have a waxy type covering and the soap helps disolve this too. My salvias haven't been bothered by aphids, but the mealybugs love it and they look like white fluffy stuff, not like powdery mildew though. A little alcahol in the soap/water mix (leared from Josephine) does wonders. I use it at the first sign of problems on my salvias.

Crow

These look like fireants. I keep seeing them on the plant, so I know the aphids are still there, although in less numbers.I will get beneficial nematodes to help too. Thanks for your help.

Unfortunately any kind of ant will farm aphids. I have them on a yaupon holly tree now. Hard to get up high enough with the soap.

Christi