Hibiscus pest...

18 years ago

I have three hibiscus plants.

All are covered in a pest that looks like tiny white moths. The leaves actually are covered in tons of white material that looks like gauze. I'm talking buckets of it.

The thing is, although ugly, the hibiscuses have been doing just fine for over a year with them. However, one is close to a seating area and when disturbed, clouds of both the gauzy material and tiny white moths are dispersed.

Any ideas what these are? How to get rid of them safely?

aiki

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Comments (6)

beachbarbie
18 years ago
Firstt hing I thought of was aphids, but then you talked about the gauzy stuff, so not really sure.
I bet though, that if you laid the plant on its side (if it's in a pot of course) and hosed it off thoroughly, making sure to get the whole plant, and use your hands to clean everything off, you could get rid of them. That's how I get rid of aphids - no chemicals and the plant enjoys the cleaning. You probably will have to do it more than once.
The reason for laying the plant on it's side is so that you don't just spray the bugs into the plants' soil. They'll most likely just crawl back up it.
Barb
aikidokap
Original Author
18 years ago
Nope, not in a pot.

The material does hose off fairly easily....and I've done it a few times.

aiki
kathi_mdgd
18 years ago
Sounds like a massive whitefly infestation.My neighbor a few years ago had that problem.He just cut it down and got rid of it,but it can be saved.Google white flies and see what they tell you.
Kathi
bruggirl
18 years ago
You need to use a systemic insecticide to kill whiteflies, like Orthene. Use it three times, every 10 days. Seems like you have a pretty bad infestation.
elke514
18 years ago
I don't like to use chemicals on my plants if I can help it. My hibiscus had white flies AND aphids. Sprayed the little suckers with 1 part alcohol to 2 parts water with a couple drops of dish soap. Works great on just about everything in the yard, particularly the aphids on roses.
zoiepoo
18 years ago
You have white flies - just like I am fighting. The most common cures are spraying the plants with soapy water, Neem oil, worm castings on ground around them or Bayer Advance Garden Tree and Shrub Insect Control which is VERY expensive but I just tried tonight since none of the other cures worked completely for me. I have 29 hibiscus that have the bottom 1/3 of the plants COVERED in the white web/larva/flies. I just came to this forum to see what others have suggested and will try their suggestions: tangle foot on yellow plastic plates because they are attracted to yellow and will stick to the tangle foot (or fly sticky traps that are yellow), Naturalus T & O, Isotox if all else fails. GOOD LUCK!!!