pests Pest Infestation.

K

kkorky

Rookie to this forum here, and although i have been a 'silent' participant for over three years-the information and written advice (given to others) has been invaluable to my growing  endeavours, so many thanks to all of the contributors.
 
This year after three years of trying, i was finally able to grow my Trinidad Scorpion pepper plants to their full potential.
 
I am an expat working in Greece & i grew the plants primarily inside & then i moved them outside- onto my balcony to make use of the summer sun.
 
I was very successful & i have been able to reap over 200 peppers from which i have made my first batch of Pepper sauce & the rest are in the freezer and shall be used as and when needed.
 
I grew Red & Yellow Trinidad scorpion (Moruga) peppers and all was fine until now. The weather has changed and i have already pruned some of my plants for overwintering BUT, all of my plants that have not been pruned as yet (due to the fact that there are around 30+ peppers that haven't ripened as yet) have over the last two weeks displayed clear signs of insect infestation.
 
I did not encounter such problems all during the summer (probably due to my preventative spraying with insecticides on two occasions during the summer period), but now ALL of my leaves have a brown rust like discolouration underneath the leaves, the tips are also brown, and many leaves displayed some silvery, clear trails on the upper side of the leaves.
 
I have been very lucky in that as i said i was able to harvest nearly all of my peppers, but my queries are as follows:
 
  • Having had a look at the picture, what is the most likely cause of the suspected infestation (see photo below)
  • Should i just throw away the plants, or should i prune them down, change their soil and spray them with insecticide to kill off any eggs etc?
 
Any replies would be greatly appreciated.
 
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Looking at the pictures, I do not see any pests. Have you seen pests? It maybe some sort of nutrient deficiency.
 
Hard to say but the dark brown almost look like sunburn and the silvery/white under the leaves look like mold/fungus.
How is the weather there lately? Damp nights followed by bright morning sun?
 
p.s. Welcome to THP :party: and Good Luck with your plants.
 
tctenten said:
Looking at the pictures, I do not see any pests. Have you seen pests? It maybe some sort of nutrient deficiency.
Click to expand...
 
Actually, no i have seen no pests at all, only what i (possibly in my ignorance) deemed to be signs of pests, ie, the silvery trails on the top of some of the leaves. I had read that certain mites or aphids leave a sugary substance on the leaves after feeding (the sticky silvery trails) which then turn into dark fungus..... that having been said, thanks for taking the time out to help.
Hawaiianero said:
Hard to say but the dark brown almost look like sunburn and the silvery/white under the leaves look like mold/fungus.
How is the weather there lately? Damp nights followed by bright morning sun?
 
p.s. Welcome to THP :party: and Good Luck with your plants.
Click to expand...
Thanks for your wishes, no it isnt leaf sunburn, i know from experience what that looks like. Secondly, the weather has been cold & damp , but without any sunshine, and remember these plants have been indoors over the last few weeks. The pics arent that good, i will try to post another couple, because that silvery/white look is actually from the flash.tyvm though for your reply.
 
Here is a better picture, it is the underside of three leaves which display what 95% of the leaves that are left, are exhibiting,
 
I should say that im more curious as to how i should handle the plants after i prune them (in around 1 weeks time), should i change the soil & then spray the 'stumps' with insecticide as a precaution, or should i not risk keeping those plants (12 in total) and start with a fresh batch come Jan/Feb?
 
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kkorky, I don't know if you have other plants that you keep indoors, but if you do be careful about bringing inside an outdoor plant that you suspect to have any pests or disease.  If you must, then quarantine the plants. You don't want to bring those little buggers indoors to let them feast on all of your plants.
 
Base on what you said about the weather, perhaps you have a mold/fungus problem. I don't see any direct mechanical damage.
 
If you can, take a leaf and try to gently scrape the black mottle off the tissue.  Is the dark mottle on the outside or the inside of the leaf tissue ?
 
Good Luck,
 
Jeff
 
MNXR250R said:
kkorky, I don't know if you have other plants that you keep indoors, but if you do be careful about bringing inside an outdoor plant that you suspect to have any pests or disease.  If you must, then quarantine the plants. You don't want to bring those little buggers indoors to let them feast on all of your plants.
 
Base on what you said about the weather, perhaps you have a mold/fungus problem. I don't see any direct mechanical damage.
 
If you can, take a leaf and try to gently scrape the black mottle off the tissue.  Is the dark mottle on the outside or the inside of the leaf tissue ?
 
Good Luck,
 
Jeff
Click to expand...
 
Hey Jeff,
 
many thanks for getting back to me. 
 
I did as you suggested and it seems that the black mottle is internal rather than external (ie on the surfaces of the leaf), constant gentle scratching only starts to destroy the surface of the leaf after a while.
 
So im guessing that according to your theory, its a fungus/mold problem.
 
If that is so, would when i prune the plants for overwintering and change their soil  deal with the issue at hand?
 
As i mentioned before, my crop did not get hit, i managed to reap 95% of the Scorpions, so i dodged the bullet, but im in two minds as to prune/change soil etc, or to dump them completely and start fresh?
 
As for your advice on outdoor/indoor plants-duly noted & many thanks.
 
In my case, i have no indoor plants per say, it was just my chilli plants that i would take in at night (even during the summer) and in the morning take them back out, so Quarantining them wasn't an issue, although some of the chilli plants seem to have been more affected than others, but still 100% of them show the same signs no matter how small.
 
In fact 2 of the plants that i had pruned 3 weeks ago, have started sprouting shoots and they too are showing the same signs albeit to a much lesser degree.
 
Some of my crop that i have in the freezer, i have around another 30-40 peppers to pick before im 100% done for this season.
 
-the Scorpions are self evident, the longer shaped chillis (average length is around 5in) are native to the Greek island of Rhodes and they grow very quickly (i pruned the plants for the winter and they have sprouted shoots already).
 
They are not as hot as the scorpions, but they provide a mild heat, i would say somewhere in between Habaneros and Scotch Bonnets.
 
I would say that the total amount of peppers will give me 4 litres of very hot chilli sauce-this is based on the Caribbean recipe that i made my first batch of sauce with.
 
And since the plants that i have, have proved that they bear a decent amount of pods, i would hate to have to dump them BUT if it means jumping through hoops to get rid of the problem, then i'd rather start over.
 

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Looks like a good crop  :P
 
As to the mold/fungus theory, if it were mold for fungus on the leaves, it would be on the outside of the leaf. You could scrape it off to reveal the green plant underneath.  So my idea is fail.
 
I can imagine then you have a nutrient problem. Not something I would worry about at this point since the outdoor season is at an end. Perhaps the roots developed a disease during the colder weather so they are unable to uptake the correct ratio of nutes. This is a guess of course.
 
I have seen this mottle before. Many of my young seedling show a black mottle similar to your leaves. The mottle remains on the older leaves, but after some time the new leaves show no such mottle. The only thing that I can think of is that the early roots are not developed enough to take up the right proportions of nutes from the soil ( I do indoor Hydro... so soil/ grow medium/whatever ). So when I smack them with nutes, the nutes are used to paint the leaves instead of growing the leaves. And, I have seen references to black mottle caused by nutes being too high. I don't have links and can't prove it  :rolleyes:.  So in your case, if everything is in order (good watering, fertilizing,etc.) them I would look at a root problem.... maybe just too low on the temps.
 
If you brought those plants indoors (since you don't have other plants... Go for it !) I would bet that if the temps are good, all that mottle would go away.  No guarantees though  LOL. 
 
As for pruning, the is a lot of information on THP..  Look up "overwintering". I think there is a sticky on it. I am not qualified to answer those types of questions... (actually, I'm not really "qualified" at all)  :party: 
 
Good luck too you and Happy Over-Wintering !!
 
Jeff 
 
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