I'm killing my Brugmansia

13 years ago

I orders 2 from the place in Florida. Got them late (actually only got l), and had 2 blooms all summer. So am saving them over winter in my little greenhouse. I'm not infested with aphids, whiteflies, and tiny little black flying things. I did the blast of water to dislodge them, but lost some leaves, and messed up some of the leaves. Waited a few days, found more aphids, so did the water blast again. I originally had ll buds on my brug, now i'm down to maybe 4-5 (rest dropped off) and the buds are distorted and some are tattered. I'm hoping some of them will still bloom, but my poor plant sure does not look good. I'm lucky if I get just a couple blooms out of this. I finally used Bayer Advanced Multi-Insect control on them today, (l tbs/gallon) along with spraying everything else in the greenhouse too.

I am bummed! I should have sprayed way before this, before I got all these darn insects in my greenhouse. What does everyone else do? I'm in the midwest.

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Comments (6)

princealbert
13 years ago
steelskies
I use a mixture of dish soap and Tea in a spray bottle.
actualy there are several variations of non poisinous concoctions that can be sprayed on including some with rubbing alcohol that work well.
do a search here on gw for home made insecticides. that might give you some bug releif.
pa
princealbert
13 years ago
http://forums.gardenweb.com/forums/load/organic/msg0811021528979.html

Here is a link that will put you in the right area.
pa
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fool4flowers
13 years ago
The only thing that will kill the tiny black gnats is to put a mosquito dunk in a bucket of water and use that to water the plants. They are called fungus gnats I think. You can use a hose end sprayer with plant safe soap for the other things.
karyn1
13 years ago
What's happening to you is one of the main reasons that I don't waste greenhouse space on brugs and just allow them to go dormant over the winter. If you really want to keep it growing over the winter I would completely defoliate it, including buds, wash the stems well, and possibly transplant into a new pot with fresh sterile soil to make sure you get rid of the infestations. You also want to make sure that your other plants aren't now infested. Defoliation won't kill the brug and new growth will develop quickly. Good luck.
steelskies
Original Author
13 years ago
karyn,
that's a great idea, i'll do that for next year. I'm bummed because I only got 2 flowers all summer, and now since moving it into my greenhouse it "had" ll buds on it. I was so excited about having so many flowers FINALLY. Now I have about 4 left.

And yes, my other plants are getting the infestation of bugs, especially the aphids. I'm stupid; why didn't I start spraying earlier than this, and before all the bugs got so bad.

this is only my 2nd year with my greenhouse; I have a lot to learn!
karyn1
13 years ago
I've had greenhouses for years and still get infestations. I don't use chemical controls (except Forbid & Floramite for broad mites) so I just try and keep everything at a manageable level until it's warm enough to go back outside. It's a lot of wiping down by hand, spraying with a hose and picking & squishing. lol Sometimes I come to the realization that I just can't keep certain varieties like tropical hibiscus because of the &%@#!!! white flies.