Spider mites in late flower

[highchome]

Hi all,

I've not been active here lately, also it seems I've not been paying enough attention to my plants. I'm in late flower with a four plants and I think I have about 2 - 4 weeks before harvest, I have amber pistils but not too many amber trichomes yet. 

Yesterday I noticed that one of the flowers was covered in web, so spider mites are having a ball . 

What are my options in late flower?

• Pyrol? I think thats a bad idea in late flower right?
• H2O2? What percentage to how much water if so?
• Anything else?

 

For now I've increased the airflow and sprayed the undersides of as many leaves as a can. I'll get a bigger spray bottle today and keep doing that.

 

Thanks for any help

[420SA]

You're late in flower now so any spray isn't a good idea at all. If only 1 branch is affected I suggest cutting your losses and cutting that branch.

If more than 1 branch is affected you basically have 2 options:

1. You manually attempt to remove as many mites as possible with your hands. I suggest wiping all the affected leaves with a small piece of cloth dipped in h202 solution (30ml of h202 per 1 litre (3% H202) but you'll need to keep doing this every few days now as the chances of getting rid of all of them is pretty low when removing by hand.
2. Get your plant into a small sealed container and fill the container with CO2. Not really possible for most people to do but it is an option...

[Oolong83]

I made the mistake of spraying my buds with neemoil in early flower, moerse mistake. The pistils were all dried out by next morning. 

I did move 2 WWidows outside due to infestation few weeks back, but the back to vegging now, which ina way is a good thing cause they were on the edge of death basically. Lost almost all their leaves, but happy that they nice and green again. 

However that being said, its not an option with the newly infected ones. They infestation isnt too hectic yet. Just noticed a few of the buds were covered with webs. 

I may go the “cutting my losses” route and just remove the infected branches. 

[CreX]

On 1/19/2020 at 9:21 AM, Oolong83 said:

I made the mistake of spraying my buds with neemoil in early flower, moerse mistake. The pistils were all dried out by next morning. 

I did move 2 WWidows outside due to infestation few weeks back, but the back to vegging now, which ina way is a good thing cause they were on the edge of death basically. Lost almost all their leaves, but happy that they nice and green again. 

However that being said, its not an option with the newly infected ones. They infestation isnt too hectic yet. Just noticed a few of the buds were covered with webs. 

I may go the “cutting my losses” route and just remove the infected branches. 

You just need to miss one mite and the problem remains.... 

Increasing your C02 will ward them away, but you need quite a lot of Co2 for it to become effective. 

A skottle braai with an open flame will work. Seal your garage, put all your plants in there... And burn that bottle  for a few hours with the garage closed... 

Temps will spike, humidity will spike up... And hopefully you can keep the most co2 you can in the garage... 

Alternatively you can move premises, preferably intercontinentally 

[1000Hills Nursery]

@Oolong83 

Sorry to hear about your issues. On the onset I would like to say if you seeing webs on buds already then the chances of a fight is quite impossible.

I've had spidermites in flower and I did manage to keep them at 'BAY' till the finish line.

First step would be to remove any leaves that has feeding marks on it.

Then remove all branches below the top of the canopy and yes that's all the branches that has medium sized buds and larfies.

Last step of defence is to drop the temperature in the grow room with an aircon light ON and OFF. Spidermites thrive in warm dry conditions and by changing that you are increasing the amount of time spidermites require to lay eggs and the time it takes eggs to hatch.

Hope this reaches you in time before you try nuking them with CO2 and then throwing them on a skottel with some chilli beef aromat...

 

[highchome]

20 hours ago, CreX said:

Alternatively you can move premises, preferably intercontinentally 

Thanks @CreX. I'll check how close to flowering I am again. If its more than a week I will try the CO2 route. I still have a CO2 bottle from my aquarium plant days

 

13 hours ago, Mambawana said:

Last step of defence is to drop the temperature in the grow room with an aircon light ON and OFF. Spidermites thrive in warm dry conditions and by changing that you are increasing the amount of time spidermites require to lay eggs and the time it takes eggs to hatch.

Thanks @Mambawana. I've increased airflow and I'm heavily misting with water for now to increase humidity.

 

Hopefully I can limp through to harvest time and then nuke the grow room.

[Oolong83]

@highchome wouldn't the high humidity fuck with bud quality? Not gonna be so dense. 

Let me know if it works and you get rid of them. Im struggling like a bitch to get rid of mine. 

And the kak part is, my flowering section is never empty. I rotate my plants, so if 2-4 come out, then 2-4 goes in from vegging. I can hold 8-10 plants in my flower section, so there’s that dilemma too. 

[Oolong83]

On 1/19/2020 at 9:21 AM, Oolong83 said:

I did move 2 WWidows outside due to infestation few weeks back, but the back to vegging now, which ina way is a good thing cause they were on the edge of death basically. Lost almost all their leaves, but happy that they nice and green again.  

Here is a pic of 1 them still outside, moved the other 1 inside last night. They were both basically bare, didn't think they'd survive. Must say they recovered nicely and spider-mites all gone from these 2.

[highchome]

On 1/24/2020 at 7:39 AM, Oolong83 said:

@highchome wouldn't the high humidity fuck with bud quality? Not gonna be so dense. 

Let me know if it works and you get rid of them. Im struggling like a bitch to get rid of mine. 

And the kak part is, my flowering section is never empty. I rotate my plants, so if 2-4 come out, then 2-4 goes in from vegging. I can hold 8-10 plants in my flower section, so there’s that dilemma too. 

@Oolong83 I'm not sure about humidity during flower, I did not know about that. I was a bit worried about mold if anything. But I think its a lesser of two evils situation, so I would have tried the humidity either way.

However its seems like I have been exceedingly lucky. With extra air flow and misting daily they have not done any damage so far, and I'm ready to start a flush today. Very very lucky indeed. So after the flush I'll bleach the whole room and try treat my young clones somehow too...

Let us know how yours go? How much damage did they do?

[Stinger96]

I volunteered in the Cannabis College in Amsterdam for a few months and this might seem extreme but the grower used a vacume cleaner to remove as much spider mites as he could. Still remember him covering the bud with the pipe. I neerly shat myself but that is how they did it.

[highchome]

@Stinger96 interesting thanks. Fortunately I was able to harvest before there was any damage. I did a quick wash of the buds and will now burn the remaining mites

If it happens again I'll consider that though, thanks