Effective mitecide?

Any other miticide options other then Neem oil? I sprayed my cucumber plants, melons, squashes, and tomatoes 4 days ago for 2 consecutive days, and the mites are back already! Green ones, red ones, white ones, my garden is infested with them! Even my little fava bean seedlings that looked fine this morning, just came in from a stroll around my little garden, are basically gone from mites!

Any suggestions?

If you can find kelthane it works well.
Oldude

Thank you oldude. Is that a brand or an ingredient in a product?
Can you suggest something that I can perhaps spray once a week or once a month, to avoid being overloaded with mites?

Kelthane is not recommended to use more than twice per season, but it has will get you to a point that you can control mites with other weekly spraying. Call your farm supply stores since you won’t find it at lows or Home depot.
Oldude

http://www.kellysolutions.com/erenewals/documentsubmit/KellyData%5COK%5Cpesticide%5CProduct%20Label%5C7401%5C707-202-7401%5C707-202-7401_Hi_Yield_Kelthane_Spray_3_15_2005_6_19_52_PM.pdf

AuntBusy - are you sure you have mites? Spider mites can be seen with the naked eye, but many mites are so small you need a magnifying glass to see them. Perhaps it's aphids that are your problem - they come in many colors. I have found the best control for aphids is PYOLA.

http://www.gardensalive.com/product.asp?pn=8101&ss=PYOLA

PYOLA will also kill spider mites, but for some mites you neee a miticide, which really should not be used on anything you are going to eat.

Well, I could not understand why my plants were looking so terrible....so I went out with my little loop and that's when I realized they are infested with these tiny little nasty pests.....

If miticides should not be used in anything you eat......what do you do then?

Thanks for trying to help.

AuntBusy - The PYOLA will kill most mites. I know it will not kill Cyclamen or Broad mites. Cyclamen mites are a.k.a. strawberry mites. I used to raise African Violets and it took me two years to eradicate cyclamen and broad mites - even tho I used miticides that were created to kill these insidious pests.

There are probably natural predators that feed on mites, but I don't know which ones :(

Thank you so much Honeybee and Oldude. I will just continue spraying with Neem and see if that eventually will help. We have been getting rain every day....so probably washing out all my treatments :-)

I was experimenting with 1 strawberry plant, do you think that I got strawberry mites, if I have those, because of it? Should I stay away from growing strawberries?

I didn't know about the African violets, thanks for the warning, I will stay far away from growing those :-)

This message was edited Jun 8, 2009 11:46 AM