Q & A

Welcome to the Planet Natural Garden Forum! Whether you’re new to gardening or have been at it for some time, here you can search existing messages for answers to your questions or post a new message for others to reply to. If this is your first visit, please read over our forum instructions carefully before posting. Enjoy!

Tagged: 

  • Releasing spider mite predators in office setting

    Created by adam on

    Hi guys,

    We’re having a lot of problems with spider mites at many of our office installations, and I found your page about predatory mites. I’m interested in experimenting with these but there’s two obvious question I need to ask: how do you apply them and once the spider mite infestation is gone, what happens to them? Also, would they be safe to use in an office setting?

  • Author
    Posts
  • #210570

    Eric Vinje
    Keymaster

    Hi Adam –

    Used successfully for years, Predatory Mites are well suited for application on all plants grown inside, an office setting is no different. In fact, we ship them across the country to several malls and airports that use them to control spider mites on their interior plantscapes. These tiny predatory insects do not bite people or pets and will not attack other pest insects such as aphids, mealybugs or whitefly. They are strictly predators of plant feeding pest mites and once they run out of food, they simply starve to death.

    Before applications, we recommend you knock-down heavy infestations (webbing and feeding marks will be noticed on plant leaves) with a short-lived, natural insecticide. Consider using an insecticidal soap, or other organic insecticide for the job. This is important, because most pest insects are capable of reproducing like crazy — that’s one reason why they’re pests. If you don’t knock them down first, you won’t see results, even though the predators are consuming them at a furious rate. Alternatively, you could purchase a large amount of predators to compete with the high pest numbers, but this wouldn’t be very cost effective. If only a few plants are infested, consider removing them.

    To release, gently mix the contents of the container — we use corn grit or vermiculite as a carrier — and shake the predators out close to mite infestations. Release 20-30 predators per medium sized plant or 2,000 (one bottle) per 700 sq ft. Control of a light infestation should occur in two to three weeks. On heavier infestations a second release may be required. Instructions for care and release are provided with each order.

    Hope this helps!

You must be logged in to reply to this topic.