How do you protect your tiny rose seedlings from aphids?
I was thinking maybe those of you who grow your rose seedlings under glass in winter, by germinating them thoroughly in the fridge, might escape these pests, though if your greenhouse is too warm the aphids might wake up and attack rose seedlings anyway?
My rose seedlings are outdoors. It is mild, sheltered and warm here, and they germinated due to the warmer weather. I am finding all my roses are covered in aphids, and I have tried a few things from ladybird larvae to hanging half a coconut up for the sparrows who if I am lucky might appear later in the season as they did last year to eat all the aphids off my roses. My garden is always full of spiders, and I did notice today the beginnings of a spiders web on my most promising rose seedlingâs pot, but no sign of the spider and there were several aphids on the seedling. Obviously the tiny rose seedlings are more vulnerable, and I have been checking on them every day and physically removing aphids with various items such as a toothpick, a flossing harp and one of those plastic serrated plaque removers, and also very carefully picking them off with my fingers and squashing them. I find aphids difficult to get off the tiny rose seedlings, and they tend to stick, moving back after I think I have nearly moved them off. My bigger roses are easier to just scrape the items along to dislodge a whole stem of aphids.
No sign of the sparrows coming to my rescue yet.
About 6 years ago I grew Angel Wings roses from seed, and I remember having to pick aphids off the tiny seedlings every single day, sometimes twice a day, for quite a long time until the plants were bigger and tougher, and the predators later in the season had dealt with the aphids. The plants did survive and I still have them, they are very tough, and I didnât break any of them in my attempts to get aphids off them, but it was a lot of hard work for a long time.
I recently noticed a group of baby snails had hatched and begun munching on mine, so I busted out the diatomaceous earth and dusted everything in my boxes. That should take care of that.
I have also recently noticed that pinkish aphids are getting out of hand on my year-old seedlings and some other older roses, but then yesterday a ladybug landed on me while I was in the garden, so âthe troops have arrivedâ. Huzzah.
Aphids canât easily be prevented indoors, either, unless you raise your seedlings completely without any plants or cuttings brought in from outsideâotherwise, they will inevitably appear and quickly get out of hand inside, too.
I have learned that for delicate hand-squashing operations, slightly wetting your fingertips (with water, or even better, insecticidal soap solution) is very helpful because more aphids will then be unable to escape death simply by letting go of the plant and falling down. Instead, they get slightly stuck to your skin, making them easier to smoosh with less effort and fewer escapes. Doing that also seems to help me avoid damaging the delicate plant parts. Itâs still fiddly, tedious work.
sometimes, when i have spider mites in my pot tent, i buy predatory insects online. this seems to work pretty well. i have used natureâs good guys in the past.
there are also sprays like lost coast plant therapy that you could try. usually they should be applied once a week or so.
if the weather is nice, you can try using a misting setting on your hose nozzle and blasting them off. this is hard if the plant is still very young.
last year, i read that crushing a few aphids will attract wasps to the plant. i also tried that on my bushes outdoors.
@lee_hull Very tempting to save a huge amount of struggling, but the scientists seem to think that neonicotinoid insecticides are harmful to bees, and even a root drench gets into every part of the plant including the pollen, and into the insects that birds eat. I love all the pollinators and birds that grace my garden, and at the moment donât feel the risk to them is worth taking. It isnât my livelihood, and if my seedlings donât make it this year I will try again next year.
I recently visited the tulip festival at Arundel castle, where they have a huge rose garden, the place is massive, and they say they use biological controls and avoid pesticides. Their roses were spotless with no aphids. They did have a gardener with a hose, and the place is big enough to cope with using a hose, which I couldnât. As I was sitting down on the grass I noticed a ladybird.
The aphids I am finding on my older roses are pinkish to red. On my tiny seedlings there are a few of these red aphids and also some miniscule green dots that I need a magnifying glass to see. I did just manage to remove just about all of them today, using a toothpick dipped in water.
I have recently noticed quite a lot of chrysalis stage, puparium, hoverflies on my wall, and every summer hoverflies are regulars in my garden.
@j.m I had read that somewhere too that crushing aphids attracts their predators. I have just tried it a bit, but didnât want to squash any of the ladybird larvae I have applied.
I need to educate myself on insects, I am not sure the difference between honeybees and parasitic wasps, but I have seen some of these appearing in my garden recently.
Diversity is key to a healthy ecosystem.
I plant my roses with other plants, with special attention to early-blooming plants like primrose, daffodils, and alyssum, to draw in pollinators and predators as early in the season as possible.
Even my seedling beds (which are of course just roses) are surrounded by other plants, to have the diversity around the small mono-culture, thereby offering the same protection to the tiny seedlings.
Every year I plant dill-seed around the edges of my rose pots, which is a guaranteed attractor of hoverflies and small predatory wasps.
The result is very little insect damage overall, and the near-elimination of insecticides.
Julie, think of honeybees as marathon-runner versions of bumblebees; theyâre still fuzzy n cute, but built MUCH LEANER, and about half-size. Most predatory wasps are very small and VERY âwaspyâ, often without the black and yellow stripes we are used to seeing, and with typically smooth and glossy bodies. They often have exaggeratedly long waists.
None of them are aggressive toward people, so yay.
Hoverflies are just flies running hummingbird-software & dressed in bee-stripes. Theyâre excellent pollinators AND predators. Best of all? Theyâre flies, so no stingers!!
Bugs, man. Too many legs for total comfort, but fascinating nonetheless.
Big booster of Lady bugs and their ânasty looking larvaeâ. Theyâre aphid harvesters.
Pruning started, but l donât toss ground detritus just yet until leaves out. Turning over last years ground fall shows promise of a of them this summer.
Hi, some years ago my seedlings were suffering from powdery mildew and I dislike spraying my seedlings so I decided to treat them with a systemic treatment, so, at the same time I thought why not treat systemically for insects as well. Systemic treatments will only impact on the little buggers that are eating your seedlings. Worth a go.
Back to APHIDS, and the necessity of biodiversity, here on Vancouver Island, BC Canada, the aphids are reaching âdisgusting, apocalyptic-levelsâ of infestationâŚ
BUT: the aphids circled in the second and third photos are already parasitized!! They become paralyzed, change colour to a dull light bronze, and appear swollen. Dunno who specifically is responsible, but thatâs what I like to see. Combined with the ladybug that landed on me last week, I know that the aphidsâ days are numbered, and I need do nothing.
Balance will be achieved.
I just googled parasitised aphid and they look exactly like some mystery small crusty spheres that I have been noticing, so far this year, strangely, only on 2 Angel Wings rose bushes in different parts of my garden, not on my other roses. I had no idea what those were, and had puzzled over them whether they were a different type of aphid.
Sorry not a good photograph, I took this photograph 3 years ago of mystery crusty spheres among the aphids that were infesting my Viola. On Violas, the aphids are severe and unless I deal with them quickly the Viola dies, this has happened a lot and seemed to respond to soaking the Violas with some water that had Erigeron karvinskianus trimmings soaked in it for a few days, if I dealt with it quickly enough. The photograph of the flowering white Viola was after treating it with Erigeron karvinskianus solution, it had almost died before that.
Nobody had any idea what those small crusty spheres were.
I get Violas coming up every year from seeding themselves.
I read somewhere that aphids are fairly species specific, and noticed that my Erigeron karvinskianus never get aphids. When my Erigeron karvinskianus start to flower, around late April, the aphid problem seems to lessen but this could be just about the time of year. Similarly when my Feverfew start to flower, later on, aphids seem to lessen. I have read different opinions about whether pollinators and predators like or dislike Feverfew, but I have seen bees on the flowers.
Julie, the daisy family Asteraceae, which includes your Erigeron & feverfew, (also tansy, yarrow, Bellis, Osteospermums, etc.), and the dill family Apiaceae (which includes fennel, parsley, celery, carrot, coriander and cumin, etc.), are both renowned sources of pollen and/or nectar for garden pollinators and predators. Planting them among your roses will only help control pests, and I heartily encourage it!!
Dusty.
SPEAKING OF TINY WASPS: I saw one âin the wildâ today, I think eating baby aphids? Was the teeniest wee wasp I ever did see, too. Much smaller than mason-bees, even! I hope that the picture resolution allows for easy viewing.
EDIT: thatâs all happening on the tiny, first-buds from the only non-precocious bloomer I kept from last yearâs seedlings of the Barbier rambler âFrançois Juranvilleâ. Iâm excited to see the first flowers from this plant.
2hrs Later EDIT: just walked outside on the deck where I noticed a ladybug now on the seedling as well; the aphidsâ days are numbered and Iâm glad of it.
I would try using some beneficial insects on the plants - that is what the commercial growers use. Try Green Lacewing larvae. Companion plants to keep the adults happy is helpful and producing (only the larvae eat the aphids
