Yea so my war on thrips is still ongoing. Little buggers just started attacking my chayote squash and cucumber plants.
Found this rather interesting.
Luring Thrips with Extracts
For a long time we've known that thrips are attracted by scent as well as visual stimuli such as color. But now there may be a way to utilize this scent-attraction to help thrips trap themselves, thus removing them from the crop. One new way to do this, even though this still requires some more experimentation, is to soak plain old cotton balls in vanilla or almond extract and place them in the crop. Apparently thrips are quite attracted to these scents and will actually make their way into the cotton balls looking for the source. The good part is once they burrow into the cotton balls they find it nearly impossible to extricate themselves. This is a novel, inexpensive approach that can help reduce thrips numbers simply by way of trapping them.
https://greenmethods.com/necessary/help ... lurethrips
There are some other tips too. Well worth a read.
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rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
Very interesting! Have you tried it yet?
Vanilla is usually listed as one of the scents that repels insects: https://www.naturallivingideas.com/22-na ... l-insects/
So I'm surprised it attracts the thrips.
I don't know about the almond scent; I haven't seen it listed as an attractant or a repellent.
But if it is true that thrips are attracted to vanilla scent and other insects are not, that would make it perfect! I would hate to do the cotton ball thing and find a bunch of honeybees tangled up in it, if they were attracted to the sweet scent.
Vanilla is usually listed as one of the scents that repels insects: https://www.naturallivingideas.com/22-na ... l-insects/
So I'm surprised it attracts the thrips.
I don't know about the almond scent; I haven't seen it listed as an attractant or a repellent.
But if it is true that thrips are attracted to vanilla scent and other insects are not, that would make it perfect! I would hate to do the cotton ball thing and find a bunch of honeybees tangled up in it, if they were attracted to the sweet scent.
Be careful with spinosad, it is omri listed because it is a bacteria. However, it can only be used once or twice a year at most and you must get good coverage or you will risk the pests developing resistance to it.
I end up tolerating the damage that thrips do because they are ubiquitous so I would never be able to get good control with them and anything I use would risk harm to the predators as well. Their predators do a better job of controlling them than I ever could. Parasitic wasps which feed on thrips may be killed by spinosad. Lacewings, minute pirate bugs, and predatory mites should not be affected. It is better than using something like seven or malathion which would indescrimanately kill everything, even the good bugs.
I end up tolerating the damage that thrips do because they are ubiquitous so I would never be able to get good control with them and anything I use would risk harm to the predators as well. Their predators do a better job of controlling them than I ever could. Parasitic wasps which feed on thrips may be killed by spinosad. Lacewings, minute pirate bugs, and predatory mites should not be affected. It is better than using something like seven or malathion which would indescrimanately kill everything, even the good bugs.
The thing about it is. I'm having a really hard time setting up a garden. The thrips are now so bad that they eat all the leaves off young plants. Well they eat the lower layer off, the leaf just drops on it own. I grew 9 lemon cucumber plants from seed. Planted them in a brand new containers with new soil from the garden center. Within 3 days all I had left was 3 plants that are all so badly damaged that I don't think they are going to last much longer either.
I planted seeds in the ground for beneficial bugs. The plants come up and are almost immediately killed.
I bought Florida friendly plants to attract beneficial bugs(Pentas lanceolata and Salvia) Looked at them today and there is leaf damage.
Naturally I don't have just thrips. They were just the most destructive. I have had a lot of rain and my containers were soaking wet for days so I have quite a bit of fungus gnats. I can only imagine the amount of bacteria and viruses the Thrips are introducing into the garden.
I started in June this year and here I am in August without one vegetable to show. I can count the plants I grew and that survived on one hand and they are all just hanging on by a thread too.
At this stage of the game it is very hard not to go for the nuclear option and bomb the yard from orbit.
I learn, I evolve my strategy and I adapt. I'll get it right. I have made up my mind to start a YouTube channel so that I can share what I learned with other South Florida Organic Gardeners because I can see how struggling like this can be discouraging.
I planted seeds in the ground for beneficial bugs. The plants come up and are almost immediately killed.
I bought Florida friendly plants to attract beneficial bugs(Pentas lanceolata and Salvia) Looked at them today and there is leaf damage.
Naturally I don't have just thrips. They were just the most destructive. I have had a lot of rain and my containers were soaking wet for days so I have quite a bit of fungus gnats. I can only imagine the amount of bacteria and viruses the Thrips are introducing into the garden.
I started in June this year and here I am in August without one vegetable to show. I can count the plants I grew and that survived on one hand and they are all just hanging on by a thread too.
At this stage of the game it is very hard not to go for the nuclear option and bomb the yard from orbit.
I learn, I evolve my strategy and I adapt. I'll get it right. I have made up my mind to start a YouTube channel so that I can share what I learned with other South Florida Organic Gardeners because I can see how struggling like this can be discouraging.
Yea I have only used it once but I use a very small amount compared to commercial growers and I don't overuse it so I don't think it will be sufficient to harm the environment. It seems thrips only like certain plants. They only eat my herbs but all my other plants don't get eaten by thrips. I think its because there are no wasps or bees near the area where my herbs are. because after moving them around to another spot they became infested with thrips.imafan26 wrote:Be careful with spinosad, it is omri listed because it is a bacteria. However, it can only be used once or twice a year at most and you must get good coverage or you will risk the pests developing resistance to it.
I end up tolerating the damage that thrips do because they are ubiquitous so I would never be able to get good control with them and anything I use would risk harm to the predators as well. Their predators do a better job of controlling them than I ever could. Parasitic wasps which feed on thrips may be killed by spinosad. Lacewings, minute pirate bugs, and predatory mites should not be affected. It is better than using something like seven or malathion which would indescrimanately kill everything, even the good bugs.
Try using predatory mites. they feed on many types thrip larvae including onion thrips, Thrips tabaci, Western flower trips( what I have) Frankliniella occidentalis, New Zealand flower thrips, Thrips obscuratus and other thrips species. They have no environmental impacts. Here is a product I found for ya if interested https://www.bioforce.co.nz/shop/products ... ite-A.html. I wish you the best!StevePots wrote:The thing about it is. I'm having a really hard time setting up a garden. The thrips are now so bad that they eat all the leaves off young plants. Well they eat the lower layer off, the leaf just drops on it own. I grew 9 lemon cucumber plants from seed. Planted them in a brand new containers with new soil from the garden center. Within 3 days all I had left was 3 plants that are all so badly damaged that I don't think they are going to last much longer either.
I planted seeds in the ground for beneficial bugs. The plants come up and are almost immediately killed.
I bought Florida friendly plants to attract beneficial bugs(Pentas lanceolata and Salvia) Looked at them today and there is leaf damage.
Naturally I don't have just thrips. They were just the most destructive. I have had a lot of rain and my containers were soaking wet for days so I have quite a bit of fungus gnats. I can only imagine the amount of bacteria and viruses the Thrips are introducing into the garden.
I started in June this year and here I am in August without one vegetable to show. I can count the plants I grew and that survived on one hand and they are all just hanging on by a thread too.
At this stage of the game it is very hard not to go for the nuclear option and bomb the yard from orbit.
I learn, I evolve my strategy and I adapt. I'll get it right. I have made up my mind to start a YouTube channel so that I can share what I learned with other South Florida Organic Gardeners because I can see how struggling like this can be discouraging.
Actually, I have thrips around all of the time. As longs as they don't kill the plants, they rarely do, I tolerate them. They make my orchid flowers age faster, so if I want them to last longer, I have to selectively isolate and spray them, but I usually don't. If I started spraying, I would killoff most of the beneficial insects and I would be on the pesticide treadmill having to spray just to keep the bugs in control. I am not willing to get rid of the orchids, roses, plumeria, and gardenia, and peppers which are thrip magnets, so I just treat when they reach a threshold for damage. Usually it is when they start mangling my pepper leaves. My main management is to cut the peppers back and wait for summer to end.
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rainbowgardener
- Super Green Thumb
- Posts: 25279
- Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2009 6:04 pm
- Location: TN/GA 7b
SteveP, I appreciate that it is VERY frustrating when you put a lot of work in to a garden and feel that you get few rewards from it. (Actually even if you never got a single veggie, I think you are getting a lot of rewards of sunshine and fresh air and exercise that is much more pleasant than going to the gym, etc., but I understand that is a hard attitude to keep while you are in the midst of it 
)
It sounds like you are a new(ish?) gardener, with a new, small garden, in So. FLA. To start with So.FLA can be a difficult place to garden in some ways. Wonderful because beautiful, tropical flowers and year around gardening, but also year around pests and diseases. Imafan can relate best, but we have had other FLA gardeners writing in with lots of pest problems. In my climate all the thrips and stuff get winter killed and have to start over from eggs that survived in the soil. Slows everyone down. But also I think new gardens can often be out of balance and I think that is what you are describing. Note imafan saying that thrips are omni-present, but do not destroy her garden and can be lived with. That's how a garden that's in balance works: there are plenty of pests, thrips, aphids, stinkbugs, and whatever, but there are also plenty of the Garden Patrol (a term we have all adopted from applestar,
, to describe all the good guys, beneficial insects, toads, birds, and whatever you have, patrolling the garden) keeping everything down to manageable levels.
New gardens, especially if they might have been treated with poisons in the past, probably don't have that. That allows the pests to thrive out of control and turn in to a destructive infestation. Having a very small garden space aggravates that, because it is harder to have room to create all the kinds of habitat that helps to have a healthy Garden Patrol: lots of different nectar flowers for the adult beneficials, some water source, maybe a tall grass patch (praying mantis for example love that), bird feeders to keep birds in your yard year around, etc.
Did you see this thread: https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/vi ... d&start=15 and the next page. It is just an example of what I am talking about. Some people write in here complaining about hornworms decimating their tomato plants. In my garden there are few hornworms, and the ones I see have usually been parasitized already. My garden takes care of itself pretty well. This whole growing season, I have been involved with getting my house ready to sell, house hunting, packing , etc. The garden has gotten very little care, but it continues to thrive.... But it takes a good while to get to this point.
Just trying to encourage you to hang in there. If you keep working on all this, next year will be better !
P.S. Did you try the cotton ball trick? I'm really interested to hear how that works!
) It sounds like you are a new(ish?) gardener, with a new, small garden, in So. FLA. To start with So.FLA can be a difficult place to garden in some ways. Wonderful because beautiful, tropical flowers and year around gardening, but also year around pests and diseases. Imafan can relate best, but we have had other FLA gardeners writing in with lots of pest problems. In my climate all the thrips and stuff get winter killed and have to start over from eggs that survived in the soil. Slows everyone down. But also I think new gardens can often be out of balance and I think that is what you are describing. Note imafan saying that thrips are omni-present, but do not destroy her garden and can be lived with. That's how a garden that's in balance works: there are plenty of pests, thrips, aphids, stinkbugs, and whatever, but there are also plenty of the Garden Patrol (a term we have all adopted from applestar,
, to describe all the good guys, beneficial insects, toads, birds, and whatever you have, patrolling the garden) keeping everything down to manageable levels.New gardens, especially if they might have been treated with poisons in the past, probably don't have that. That allows the pests to thrive out of control and turn in to a destructive infestation. Having a very small garden space aggravates that, because it is harder to have room to create all the kinds of habitat that helps to have a healthy Garden Patrol: lots of different nectar flowers for the adult beneficials, some water source, maybe a tall grass patch (praying mantis for example love that), bird feeders to keep birds in your yard year around, etc.
Did you see this thread: https://www.helpfulgardener.com/forum/vi ... d&start=15 and the next page. It is just an example of what I am talking about. Some people write in here complaining about hornworms decimating their tomato plants. In my garden there are few hornworms, and the ones I see have usually been parasitized already. My garden takes care of itself pretty well. This whole growing season, I have been involved with getting my house ready to sell, house hunting, packing , etc. The garden has gotten very little care, but it continues to thrive.... But it takes a good while to get to this point.
Just trying to encourage you to hang in there. If you keep working on all this, next year will be better !
P.S. Did you try the cotton ball trick? I'm really interested to hear how that works!