Little white fuzzy bugs

Slippertalk Orchid Forum

Help Support Slippertalk Orchid Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

bwester

Well-Known Member
Joined
Jun 7, 2006
Messages
1,238
Reaction score
1
Title says it all.... I have little white fuzzy looking things on my orchids. Any idea as to what they might be?
 
bwester said:
Title says it all.... I have little white fuzzy looking things on my orchids. Any idea as to what they might be?

uh oh... mealys? never seen little white fuzzy bugs but I've seen pictures of pests and it sounds like a mealy.

I'm not sure though. I'm sure someone that knows more on this will put in their 2 cents
 
I'd bet they're mealies. Mealies suck (literally!) but they aren't as bad as some things and if it isn't too bad an infestation they are easy peasy to erradicate. I prefer the alcohol saturated q-tip or cotton pad method myself. You do need to really make sure you get them all and keep checking.
 
I'm a bit too lazy to do the spot eradication method with q-tips and cotton pads. I put my suspect plants in the shower and grab my bottle of Safer's Soap and just spray everything down. That way the stuff gets into the little nooks and crannies. Rinse and repeat every week for 3 weeks just to safe.
 
okay, but I had Safer's issues.
(they get you by putting "safer" in the name!)
I almost killed three plants w/ "Safer's" I still contend this is what set back my dianthum which hasn't bloomed in two years.

I'd like to take this opportunity to officially nominate Brian (likespaphs) as our resident "bug guy". (May I do that? I hope so.) He's a genius when it comes to killing bugs nicely. He runs the integrative pest management program at a prominant northeastern conservatory. Yippee!
Go Brian!
 
Heather said:
okay, but I had Safer's issues.
(they get you by putting "safer" in the name!)
I almost killed three plants w/ "Safer's" I still contend this is what set back my dianthum which hasn't bloomed in two years.

This is from someone who thinks Superthrive is bad for plants...:poke:
 
Heather said:
okay, but I had Safer's issues.
(they get you by putting "safer" in the name!)
I almost killed three plants w/ "Safer's" I still contend this is what set back my dianthum which hasn't bloomed in two years.

I'd like to take this opportunity to officially nominate Brian (likespaphs) as our resident "bug guy". (May I do that? I hope so.) He's a genius when it comes to killing bugs nicely. He runs the integrative pest management program at a prominant northeastern conservatory. Yippee!
Go Brian!


I second the nomination for Brian.
 
how little and how fuzzy? I get springtails from time to time, and the larvae look like maggots...but only 1 mm in length.
 
howdy, folks.
white and fuzzy is often citrus mealybugs. long tailled mealies don't make the cottony sacks, which are the eggs sacks. in a large enough area, one can use either citrus mealybug parasitiods (parasitiods are like parasites, but parasites don't kill their hosts, parasitiods do...) or a beetle called, appropriately, mealybug destroyers (Cryptolamous montrezeri, or a similar spelling). also, lacewing larvae are effective, actually, more so than crypts as crypts often take off before all the mealybugs are gone.
 
Sorry, I didn't know what kind of mealies I had. They all look the same to me...
I just picked that page coz there were decent shots of what mealies looked like :)
 
I dont know what they are, they left a cotton like substance behind when they were killed.... weird
 
YES!!! Exactly like that. GRRRRR. I've been spraying Isotox and pyrethrins to try to kill it. Thanks for the ID.
 

Latest posts

Back
Top