Last week I thought I saw the beginnings of what I thought was spider mite on a couple of my peppers so I got some of this Schultz's Insecticidal Soap... to take care of them...
It may have just been a drier plant and a few small flecks of dirt but it could have been spider mite even though I regularly mist the leaves with distilled water a couple of them were looking like it could be the begging of spider mites... no web though... I am pretty sure some of the house plants I have, do have spider mite even though they are doing well and show now signs.
Anyway I digress....
I sprayed the plants down good with Schultz's Insecticidal Soap and let them be... and maybe 5 or 6 hours later I noticed the leaves started to wilt... they were not anywhere near the sun but under a regular household fluorescent light...
I gave them a good washing after that and they seem to be doing better now but a lot of the leaves appear blotchy, burned and several fell off... at least it doesn't look like it damaged any of the sprouting leaves that look like they are starting to come out so maybe they will spring back better than before now that a lot of the bigger leaves are gone.. I've removed the really bad ones but left some of the still soft but curled leaves and the blotchy ones for now...
Should I clip off the blotchy ones too or leave them be for now? They aren't really curling up or feel like they are going to fall off yet...
The plants do seem to wilt a bit more now if I run the light much more than 6 hours and let the soil move into a normally comfortable level of moisture .... the plants seem to want a bit less light right now and a bit more water....
When I watered them down good (so it ran out the bottom) ,reduced the light exposure a bit to around 6-8 hours and they seem to be doing a lot better now.... it is weird... people keep saying not to water much but I water mine down real well every couple days in the clay pots and maybe add another day or two for the ones in the non clay pots and they seem fine... I guess they do drain well enough and the soil isn't rotting... I think clay pots breath better and help fight the root rot better than plastic even when these were seedlings they seemed to do better when the soil was a bit more on the moist side.
So my question is how do you apply this "safe soap" insecticide stuff without killing the plant, it is supposed to be safe on all sorts of plants.... but anything but real thick leaf plants don't do well with it...
I don't think I'll use it again, but what should I use if I do actually get a bit of the spider mite... they can get bad really quick
**Edit**
Here is a link to some of the damage.. I'd say about 5 or 6 leaves off each plant have already fallen off but the rest don't seem too bad... but it didn't go well with them
http://s289.photobucket.com/albums/ll210/zokambaa/After%20the%20spray/?start=all
It may have just been a drier plant and a few small flecks of dirt but it could have been spider mite even though I regularly mist the leaves with distilled water a couple of them were looking like it could be the begging of spider mites... no web though... I am pretty sure some of the house plants I have, do have spider mite even though they are doing well and show now signs.
Anyway I digress....
I sprayed the plants down good with Schultz's Insecticidal Soap and let them be... and maybe 5 or 6 hours later I noticed the leaves started to wilt... they were not anywhere near the sun but under a regular household fluorescent light...
I gave them a good washing after that and they seem to be doing better now but a lot of the leaves appear blotchy, burned and several fell off... at least it doesn't look like it damaged any of the sprouting leaves that look like they are starting to come out so maybe they will spring back better than before now that a lot of the bigger leaves are gone.. I've removed the really bad ones but left some of the still soft but curled leaves and the blotchy ones for now...
Should I clip off the blotchy ones too or leave them be for now? They aren't really curling up or feel like they are going to fall off yet...
The plants do seem to wilt a bit more now if I run the light much more than 6 hours and let the soil move into a normally comfortable level of moisture .... the plants seem to want a bit less light right now and a bit more water....
When I watered them down good (so it ran out the bottom) ,reduced the light exposure a bit to around 6-8 hours and they seem to be doing a lot better now.... it is weird... people keep saying not to water much but I water mine down real well every couple days in the clay pots and maybe add another day or two for the ones in the non clay pots and they seem fine... I guess they do drain well enough and the soil isn't rotting... I think clay pots breath better and help fight the root rot better than plastic even when these were seedlings they seemed to do better when the soil was a bit more on the moist side.
So my question is how do you apply this "safe soap" insecticide stuff without killing the plant, it is supposed to be safe on all sorts of plants.... but anything but real thick leaf plants don't do well with it...
I don't think I'll use it again, but what should I use if I do actually get a bit of the spider mite... they can get bad really quick
**Edit**
Here is a link to some of the damage.. I'd say about 5 or 6 leaves off each plant have already fallen off but the rest don't seem too bad... but it didn't go well with them
http://s289.photobucket.com/albums/ll210/zokambaa/After%20the%20spray/?start=all