Aphids used to be a big problem in my garden until I stopped fertilizing so heavily. Now I find that I usually only get aphids in the summer time when I can’t keep up with irrigation leading to stressed overheated plants that are screaming for aphids to come attack them. Now for the first time I have the reverse problem, way too much water from all the rain we have been getting! This has stressed out my kale plants which are tucked into a pocket of my garden that barely gets any direct sun near the soil level leading to soggy soil. Historically I have battled with the aphids through using organic pesticides but I quickly found that it was just a game of cat and mouse leading to lots of pesticides use that could harm other insects. Instead I have switched to fully using water to blast away aphids and stunt their populations. This has the added benefit of allowing beneficial insects to step in at some point as well since we aren’t using any pesticides!
believe it or not this is a kale plant and the reason why it looks like this is because of aphids before we address the lack of leaves let’s talk about why aphids show up in the first place they could sense weakness in your plants and will attack the ones that are the most stressed usually things like too much heat or too much fertilizer what stress plants out but in this case I think it’s too much rain that’s because too much rain leads to soggy soil which locks out oxygen and suffocates plant roots now that we know we have them let’s talk about how to get rid of them you can try treating it with pesticides but I find that that doesn’t really work instead I find it much easier to just reset the plant by removing all of the outer leaves until you’re left with just a tiny little core of baby leaves absolutely covered in aphids now we just blast them all away you want to make sure you get it from every single side a single aphid can reproduce asexually so you want to come by every day check for more and blast them away over time you will destroy the aphid population and the plants should be able to recover fully
29 Comments
I have an easier method. Plant common milkweed nearby and the aphids will leave your veggies and roses alone. They prefer the milkweed. It works beautifully for me!
Dude you should try ladybug aphids ARe their favorite foods
I recently found ants farming little black aphids on my Quinoa plant. I got all those little buggers with neem oil. So far, so good.
Gonna be doing lots of work because the aphids are thriving on my corn. But I have a three sisters crop, so the corn is the sacrifice. Hopefully they stay off the beans like they have so far!
A solution of water, dish soap, and olive oil work wonders for getting rid of aphids as well!
❤ THANK YOU
What about buying ladybug larvae? Ladybugs are being pushed out by the similar but invasive and aggressive Asian Lady beetle (although both eat aphids). It's a win-win!
What about the ones that are being farmed? We have ants farming aphids in my experimental apple saplings. I've been blasting them every night when I water but I haven't done much other than that because I'd rather them eat the saplings than my other garden plants. 🤦
Good information.
Thank you❤🌿❤
Ever since I started feeding my garden milk, my aphid problem is almost completely gone. I found out, later, that it's the milk I'm using that is the reason.
I dont have a long enough growing season to reset lol
Aphids are born pregnant. I kid you not.
Yeah, I tried screwing around with these useless "hacks" and lost my plants because of it. A good pyrethrin spray and they're gone the next day.
A tiny bit of plain ol' dish soap mixed with a lot of water is a great treatment. The dish soap WRECKS aphids. Less soap is better than more.
Crazy I did this and it works! I just seen this video now I spray the leaves down but like they say it’s better to have veggies with bugs that veggies without!
Bronners peppermint Castile soap.
1tbsp per gal. Shake and spray away. I hit every plant at least once a week. Works for thrips and other soft bodied pests as well. I almost exclusively use this. Beetles and such might need other treatments tho
Yall need ladybugs
If you spray them, aren't you just pushing them off to your other plants?
Try a fumer rather than take off leaves n use half milk n half water to fume them
What would you do with okra? If I tear the leaves off won’t it die? I spray it down but they just regenerate in a couple days. I’m so desperate 😅. I live in Florida so it’s prob too much rain and too much heat I just did a new fertilization this past week. But b4 they were def not fertilized for at least 2-3 months.
aphids wrecked my succulents before. Luckily they got nothing against neem oil XD
And now we know why lady bugs are sold in bulk on Amazon 😂😂😂❤aphids are the worst.
I found some on my cabbage plant and sprayed them off with hose and gone now
Or introduce ladybugs
spray it to the next plant
Spay them away? Does it drown them? Won't they just climb back on the plant?
Ladybugs entered the chat…🐞
How can he so casually touch the aphids, as soon as i spot them I feel so itchy and even with gloves i can't touch the plant! If i blast mine with a hose I'm convinced they'll fly onto my head, crawl in my ear, reside on my brain… ok i can see my own paranoia
Neem oil works really well