A post-aphid update

Back about 6 or 7 weeks ago I sprayed my collection with Bayer 3-in-1, a systemic pesticide that I heard was pretty gentle on sundews. It killed off all the aphids I could see, and they didn't come back for a while. Then a couple weeks ago a clutch of eggs must have hatched, because my Drosera aliciae had a swarm of them up the flower stalk. Here's that flower stalk now.

It's a graveyard on there.

It looks bad, but actually I'm super stoked. I didn't reapply any pesticide, but the stalk is covered with aphid skeletons, and very few living aphids. It seems that the systemic application has persisted long enough to take care of a new generation. I think I'll respray today though, just to make sure we don't see another spike once this round eventually wears out.

As I said, my plants didn't seem to mind the spraying. The only possible exception was this Drosera schizandra, but it's definitely doing better now.

I love sticky spinach.

That leaf at 5 o'clock there got burned on the tip around the time I sprayed. Can't say if that was due to the spray though, cause the nearby Utricularia praelonga had a pretty bad case of aphids, which may have also afflicted the D. schizandra. The new growth looks promising though.

I have another D. schizandra in with my Drosera 'Marston Dragon'. It's a bit hard to see beneath all the foliage, but it's doing pretty well down there.

This one seems to be doing well. I can barely see it though.

I really need to figure out what I'm doing with that dragon.

One of the plants that has been looking best lately, and that didn't mind the spraying even a little bit, is Byblis liniflora.

Love the shape of the flower stalk.

I'm really glad I started growing this plant. It's got an ethereal quality all its own, and it's been really popular with visitors to my collection. Plus the flowers are really cute.

The flowers persist for a couple days, it's cool.

I haven't yet gotten any seed from it though. This is supposed to be a super self-fertile species. Maybe I should try helping the pollination along. I definitely need to get some seed from it, cause I don't think it lives too long. Annuals are weird.

Aphids: My Tiny Foes

This aphid thing is getting out of control.

Aphids all over Drosera capensis Baineskloof.

There are several pots in my collection that look like this. Limited applications of Pyrethrin haven't proven effective, and I'm not willing to use it more heavily, considering that several different species reacted poorly even to the light applications. I've ordered some Bayer 3-in-1, which is a rather toxic systemic. Luckily this is my indoor collection, so I'm not too worried about hurting pollinators or anything. I just...I need to get rid of the aphids. I've been busy lately, and the aphids are just another discouragement when it comes to spending time with my plants.

Okay, let's cheer ourselves up. I've got a couple Drosera tomentosa germinations!

It's easier to see if you click through to the large sized photo.

Just a couple, but this seed sat around for a while before I got around to sowing it, so I'm happy with anything.

I picked up a really nice wide-leaf Drosera capensis on my last visit to California Carnivores.

I feel like more people are digging D. capensis lately. That's awesome.

Big, strappy leaves. You can never have too many D. capensis varieties.

My Drosera ultramafica × spatulata was looking spectacular so I had to take a photo.

A prize-winning plant! Love this hybrid.

Easily the brightest red plant in my collection, and an easy grower to boot.

Finally, my Drosera natalensis pot is also looking excellent during this period of neglect.

Fluorescent lighting really shows the dewdrops well.

So dewy and perfect! I like the nice color contrast with the moss as well.

Okay, I feel better now. I'll feel a lot better once I get this infestation under control though.

Response to Take Down Garden Spray

As you may remember, I've been using Take Down Garden Spray on my collection recently to combat aphids. The active ingredients are pyrethrin and canola oil, so it's pretty gentle stuff. Still, some plants have reacted better than others.

Drosera collinsiae and Drosera ×snyderi have definitely not appreciated the applications.

Don't look so down buddy.

Fried! Frazzled! An unhappy plant.

A handful of other plants have had a similar, but less severe, reaction. I'm using a 2% solution right now, and this is after I applied it twice in 5 days, and then didn't apply for a week. To be fair though, these two plants were both slow to settle into my conditions, and have both seemed a bit on the fragile side.

Other plants, like Drosera anglica CA × HI, have totally taken the spraying in stride.

I know I can always count on this guy to do well.

It's even blooming again! It bears repeating that this is one of the most vigorous plants in my collection as well. It just seems like the finicky plants are going to be finicky, and the robust plants won't mind (my Drosera adelae has also been fine, for example). It's not a surprising finding, but it's good to know.

On a related note, my Drosera spiralis is definitely not phased. Not only is it flowering again, but it's put out an offset for the first time!

Look at those cute little baby leaves.

I'm really inordinately fond of this species. It just does so well for me, and gives me all sort of nice surprises. Looking forward to the little guy growing up a bit.

Of course, none of this has addressed whether or not the aphids are being beaten back. Well, I think they are? I hope they are? I'll need to apply a few more times before I make a solid decision. However, I am considering going systemic pretty soon. My patience is wearing thin. We'll see!

Aphids: The Aftermath

As I've mentioned a few times in the past, I've had problems with aphids lately. I don't know where they came from, but come they did, first attacking my Drosera anglica CA × HI, then my Drosera aliciae, and then to the rest of my collection. I ended up attacking them with Take Down Garden Spray, which is Pyrethrin and canola oil. Damon over at California Carnivores recommended Take Down, and after a month of repeated applications I think I've got the aphids on the retreat.

That's not without them taking their toll. Apparently one thing that aphids can do is make a plant just divide its growth point like crazy. This D. aliciae is the most dramatic example of the phenomenon. When the aphids struck it was only one plant. Now...

Now that's one, two, three...

Four, five...six? growth points. Seven?

I think there are seven plants there now? Or at least growth points. I don't really know. I suppose someday I might separate them out, but for now I kind of like how it looks.

The D. anglica CA × HI, which was hit much harder, also split.

This pot is a mess.

It's a bit harder to see, since there are some Drosera ultramafica × spatulata in there, and maybe a couple Drosera burmannii. It's a big mess in the growth point though.

My D. burmannii also had some aphids, but since D. burmannii don't divide they just got to suffer.

My poor D. burmannii are such troopers.

I'm not sure, but I think I may have noticed some caterpillar droppings in there too. Poor D. burmannii, just getting the one-two punch.

I was very very annoyed to see aphids on my Utricularia longifolia flower stalk. Either because of the aphids, or because of the repeated applications of Take Down, a few of the buds didn't develop, and the older ones faded earlier than I had expected.

I'm still very happy to have these flowers.

At least they're gone now. I think. The new flowers still look great.

Whenever I talk about pests in my collection I like to also talk about bugs getting eaten. This is a fly that got trapped by my Dionaea 'B-52' just as my roommate and my dad were out looking at my Sarracenia with me.

It was a whole mini-drama.

This photo is very ghoulish – the fly is reaching its front legs out in a (futile) attempt to escape.

Before I started growing carnivores I was never the sort of kid to, say, burn an ant hill with a magnifying glass, or pull the wings off of moths. I catch spiders in my house and put them outside instead of smashing them. Carnivorous plants, though, have a certain elegant brutality that allows me to appreciate their particular style of minor violence. Just look that that Dionaea photo. It's grim.

. . .

Btw one of my Byblis liniflora is forming a stem.

Now I'm becoming enamored of Byblis. This could be a problem.

Nice!

Various goings-on

The other day I decided to try another of the aphid-busting treatments I've seen mentioned: immersion in water to drown the little bugs. I submerged Drosera burmannii and Drosera ultramafica × spatulata in distilled water for 2 days, and then brought them back out into the quarantine tray.

Looking messy post-soak.

They look a bit bedraggled, but hopefully that will have killed all the aphids themselves. There may still be eggs in the soil, so I really need to unpot these things and pot them up again fresh. I've heard that Neem oil can be effective against the pests in the soil, but that's another task. Let's give it some time to figure stuff out.

There's also something weird in my Drosera scorpioides pot.

These plants look hilarious like this.

Besides looking like hilarious aliens from the gemmae, those mounds of peat are very confusing. My friend Anne suggested it might be ants in the pot, and I really hope she's wrong. For the moment, however, I haven't seen any ants walking around, nor have I seen mealies or aphids that they sometimes start farming. I'll have to handle this pot to get at those last few gemmae, and then we'll see.

In more straight-up positive news, my Drosera helodes are flowering, having fully recovered from their gemmae-making.

D. helodes is bouncing back quickly.

I sowed some of those gemmae on a sand-topped pot but those plants are still quite young. Looking forward to seeing the flowers on these.

Out back the Sarracenia continue to go crazy. Here's Sarracenia ×formosa (which is S. psittacina × minor) with a flower bud and 2 new pitchers developing.

The specific epithet is no mistake, this is a beautiful plant.

I got this plant from Meadowview back at the end of August, and it was breathtaking when I unwrapped it and potted it up. It looked a bit dazed in my conditions for a month and then died back, so I'm really excited to see it now that it's all situated.

Finally, the first new growth is coming up on my old Sarracenia minor as well.

Little baby pitcher.

This is an exceedingly handsome plant when it's in full growth, and the pitchers from last fall are still around looking good. Can't wait to see the new flush!

Another pest follow-up

So I've had a (mercifully small) problem with aphids in a couple pots lately. My Drosera anglica was worst hit, and my Drosera collinsae recovered quickly. The weirdest one has been my Drosera aliciae. I didn't document its decline particularly well, but I stuck it in the quarantine tray some time ago, and it appears to have gotten better. I think? I never found any actual aphids on it, but it was going down in the exact same way as my D. anglica (even though they were across the room from each other).

Anyway, it's flowering now, which is stupid.

What a dumb little flower stalk.

It also appears to have split into at least 3 growth points.

It's a mess in there.

Again, as with my D. anglica I'm intending to let it settle in, start growing properly again, and then repot. I'll dump all the media and wash the plant well to get rid of any residual aphids/eggs. If I get 3 plants out of it then well, all the better.

Speaking of the D. anglica, there's at least one proper growth point on it again.

It's heartening to see new growth at least.

As you can see the original crown is a huge mess. I've got no idea how it's going to develop, but I guess we'll see. I bet it'll grow well with a bit of a feeding.

In any case, my backup plant is coloring up nicely being closer to the lights.

I love how quickly this is getting red.

Sure glad I have extras!

In other news, check this out.

The flowers are smaller than I expected.

Computer, zoom and enhance.

Beautiful red color.

Drosera adelae flowers are really pretty.

Aphid busting

Last week I posted about a couple plants that are having some problems and I learned that my Drosera anglica CA x HI had aphids. I had a lot of things going on that week and just didn't have time to address it. Yesterday though, I noticed some of the little buggies on my Drosera collinsiae Faryland and I knew I couldn't wait any longer.

A heavily afflicted plant.

The aphids just recently appeared on this one.

"Computer, zoom and enhance."

Barry Rice says aphids are cute.

Let's get real up-close with the little freeloaders.

Whatever you say Barry.

Little sapsuckers.

Luckily aphid treatment doesn't (usually) require gnarly pesticides. The first line of defense is just isopropyl alcohol, applied with a cotton swab.

A great reckoning is upon us.

Judged and found wanting.

Welcome to your doom.

After some consideration, I decided to trim the flower stalk from the D. collinisae, since that's the only place I saw the aphids, and also to extract the gnarled mutant stalk from the D. anglica, since I suspected there were probably aphids hiding in the cracks.

Desperate times, desperate measures, etc.

I'll be checking in on these plants over the next couple weeks, since apparently aphids are prolific egg-layers and you need to treat repeatedly to make sure they actually get wiped out. Luckily, I do have backup D. anglica plants in case the worst happens.

This is from the cuttings that I thought had died!

This is the Summer Batch.

No backups of the D. collinsiae, but luckily I caught that one pretty early.

For now they're in quarantine. More updates as events warrant.

Fingers crossed.