sage plant pests

[rainbowgardener]

I happened to be looking at my new little sage plant, which replaced the big old one that didn't make it through the harsh winter, and discovered it was crawling with ants. Hmmm, why would ants be crawling on sage, I bet I know. Sure enough, it was pretty well covered in aphids, which the ants were farming. Ordinarily with aphids, I would just squish them. But I have found by painful experience that ants can be quite aggressive when defending "their" aphids. So I got out the bottle of soapy water spray, which I have recommended here many times, but not really used myself. Very impressive! The aphids seemed to just melt away. The ants not so much. After I did a thorough soaping, I got plain water for rinsing and put the sprayer on a hard jet. I was able to blast the ants off pretty well, but they weren't killed and will probably be back soon. I will have to keep an eye on the plant now, see if the ants bring more aphids back to replace the ones they lost.

[pow wow]

This is my first time trying to grow sage. I have several plants in my veggie trug and all seem healthy. However I got hit with an aphid infestation early this spring in my greenhouse. I took me a few weeks until I was sure I had them all. My little sage seedlings were also hit and I killed the last few aphids on them when I planted them into the trug about four weeks ago. Been keeping a close eye on them since and so far no more aphids.