Spider mites...again

[BrassavolaStars]

I had thought that I had gotten rid of them last fall but I was wrong. Awful, web-spinning spider mites have once again attacked my plants.

Strangely, they completely ignore most of my plants but grievously attacked a few. In this case it was my favorite non-orchid, a 5 foot tall sambac jasmine that I’ve had for many years and a Dendrobium golden blossom marginata.

The Dendrobium is variegated but you wouldn’t know it anymore as all the leaves look completely silver. Thankfully it has the start of two new, untouched, canes or I would probably have to replace it. I have broken out the Bayer 3-1 and the Azamax.

I would post pictures, but the damage is so severe it might give someone nightmares. Oddly, the spider mites seem to have a distaste for cattleyas and vandas (good because that’s 70% of my collection). They don’t even bother my Phals, Paphs, or Catasetums. So far, they’ve only shown interest in the Den. nobiles, the citruses, and the jasmine.

I guess the bright side is that damage to Dendrobium nobiles isn’t permanent because they lose their leaves anyway. The jasmine is another story.

Thankfully I’ll be able to bring it outside this week and that should be the end of mites.

Sorry to the admins. This double posted for some reason. I erased the posting in the other accidental thread so it can just be deleted without merging. Hopefully that was somewhat helpful in rectifying my mistake.