As I was trying to grow my Thai peppers (dont know specific name) from seed that a neighbor brought back from Thailand this summer, get my bhut jolokia going again, I discovered something rather interesting and yet terrible.
Thrips.
I have never seen these before, I have seen mites, but thats from bringing peppers from outside with dirty soil from my yard and giving them to much comfort without the armies of ladybugs we have here. They have been devistating these few lonely plants I was nursing back to health while germinating some new seeds. I started seeing thrips. I thought I had contaminated soil but what I found really threw me for a loop. I thought I had seen black specs in my rockwool cubes that I purchased from an online retailer of garden supplies (they'll remain nameless for now). I didnt think anything of it, having never used rockwool before to germinate plants. I got thrips in a second garden but the only thing in common with the two is having germinated seeds in rockwool that came from the same package.
Out of a whim I put the rockwool under the microscope and found bodies and eggs of these bugs. LOTS of them. They were wrapped in plastic, dry, and away from anything biological. There is no reason that thrips would have settled in these.
The lesson I learned was to sterilize everything before you use it. I tried pyrethrum and its basically candy for these bastards. Disgusted I put the plants outside for a night (its cold now) and dusted them with sevin (I know, I hate this shit) and then put them under a window inside. They might make it but most of the other plants just had to be tossed.
Do you think me leaving the RW cubes in the freezer for a few days will kill off all pests? should I soak or rinse them in light bleach? has anyone EVER seen rockwool with an infestation. Is this sabbotage? I'd really hate to get something like roaches from rockwool because the warehouse where the products were stored had some kind of problem.
I've emailed the vendor, but its been almost 24 hours with no reply. It will probably take a few days for a reply.
MHz
Thrips.
I have never seen these before, I have seen mites, but thats from bringing peppers from outside with dirty soil from my yard and giving them to much comfort without the armies of ladybugs we have here. They have been devistating these few lonely plants I was nursing back to health while germinating some new seeds. I started seeing thrips. I thought I had contaminated soil but what I found really threw me for a loop. I thought I had seen black specs in my rockwool cubes that I purchased from an online retailer of garden supplies (they'll remain nameless for now). I didnt think anything of it, having never used rockwool before to germinate plants. I got thrips in a second garden but the only thing in common with the two is having germinated seeds in rockwool that came from the same package.
Out of a whim I put the rockwool under the microscope and found bodies and eggs of these bugs. LOTS of them. They were wrapped in plastic, dry, and away from anything biological. There is no reason that thrips would have settled in these.
The lesson I learned was to sterilize everything before you use it. I tried pyrethrum and its basically candy for these bastards. Disgusted I put the plants outside for a night (its cold now) and dusted them with sevin (I know, I hate this shit) and then put them under a window inside. They might make it but most of the other plants just had to be tossed.
Do you think me leaving the RW cubes in the freezer for a few days will kill off all pests? should I soak or rinse them in light bleach? has anyone EVER seen rockwool with an infestation. Is this sabbotage? I'd really hate to get something like roaches from rockwool because the warehouse where the products were stored had some kind of problem.
I've emailed the vendor, but its been almost 24 hours with no reply. It will probably take a few days for a reply.
MHz
