Scales On All My Catts-Throw away or Keep
 

I have a heavy infestation of scale on all my catts. I havent' had time to even try to control lately. Question is: Too far gone, start over or keep and try to contol. If it answer is throw all away, what do I need to do to prevent them from starting over on new plants?

Thanks

I had a terrible mealy bug problem, and I wipped down the whole plant with an ethanol solution and repoted it in a new mix(they were in the bark too <O.O>) It's doing much better, with occational signs, nothing bad. I would just scap/smush all visible scalies off, as messy as it can be, and go from there. I would try to save it... Good luck!

Linda,
My collection kind of got away from me the past two years while a took care of a fatally ill family member. I just repotted the whole collection and divided and threw away a lot of the infested parts and kept the parts with small infestations or no infestation. Each plant was thoroughly cleaned and sprayed during the repotting process. The spray I used was
a home made concoction of "Dog flea and tick Shampoo" Acohol and water - no kidding. 4 months have passed and the plants look clean but are inspected often and resprayed when the stuff starts. By the way I used 3000 pounds of potting mix and a lot of new pots - it was not a small effort.
Be sure and disinfect your hands between plants-----

Wow! A ton and a half of potting mixture. How big is your collection+

Wow! That is a lot of mix! Thanks for the info. I have some free time next week. I will try to tend to this. Thanks

Too funny, in March every plant form the Oncidium alliance was infected by spider mites. I hosed them down in the shower and after they were dry, I sprayed them with a home made mix which held doggy shampoo (against flees, mites and ticks), alcohol and water ;)
I sprayed them a second time, just to be sure, after 7 days and never saw a spider mite again!

The insecticide in the shampoo I used was permethrin. On the other hand I used fipronil (against ticks and flees on dogs) to kill scale on a plant from the Buxaceae family. It was heavily infested and it was impossible to remove the scale by hand because the tree like shape from that plant. It was kind of win or kill (the plant) situation and 1 application did the trick, but I wouldn't dare to use this spray on orchids, because the leaves might cool too mucht due to evaporation.
I don't know if fipronil can be used on orchids anyway.

Nicole

My choice would be spraying the whole lot with a horticultural oil / water solution.
Its non toxic (to humans) ,and very effective.
Has to be repeated three times at a week interval each time.
Best done outside.
Good luck
Spiro

by all means dont throw the collection out! try to eradicate them by using a good systemic insecticide against chewing pests....ortho makes a good one....spray every week for however long it takes! repot and clean all the plants as you repot....clean with rubbing alcohol and q tips....gl

Thanks for mentioning the Hort. oil (Ultra fine Oil)- I also used a tsp per qt with the alcohol and flea soap - it helps the poision stay around longer - but keep you plants in shade for a day if you use it - using hort. oil in full sun can lead to some sun scorch. If hort oil is sprayed in the evening I seem to get away with it. I really had a problem with sun scorch when I used neem oil - so dont use it any more. I spray my 2000 or so cymbidiums with the hort oil with a little of the Dog soap (Be sure to get the cheap stuff without the lanolin)about once a month on a cloudy afternoon so that the plants get 12 hours without sun then mist before the morning sun hits. The 3000 lbs of potting mix was on the orchids other than cymbidiums also around 2000. The only plants I have that do not seem to like hort. oil are my miltonias and oncidiums. Maybe it was too sunny ----- My Paphs and Phrags dont seem to mind. (Onc and Milt are a little hard to grow in Florida anyway)

Toss em out Ill send you a trash box to put em in........LOL. prepaid of course