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Sugar looking powder on year old Chocoat hab

shaggs2riches

shaggs2riches

Recently, I started noticing the chocolate habanero plant, that I kept from last season, has a white powder/residue on a lot of the leaves. The residue kind of looks like sugar has been sprinkled on it in places. The lower sets of leaves have more than others. Some only have a few specks of it others it is really noticeable. The floor of my grow cupboard is kind of sticky from it falling off the plant. Google search couldn't bring up anything like it for me. I thought it might be a pest, but I came up with nothing like it.
 
You sure it's powder and not woolly aphids
 
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whoolly-aphid.jpg
 
These are not aphids that I can tell. I had an aphid infestation all last winter and this looks nothing like it. I will take some pictures later and post them. I'm going to do a better look over and see if I can see any bugs that I havent been able to notice at quick glance. If I find anything I will post that too. It almost resembles granulated sugar had got spilled on it.
 
Hybrid_Mode_01 said:
 
 
     What does? :think:
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The messy shit that they make.
.
If it doesn't look exactly like something that you've seen, remember that there are dozens of species of whitefly.
.
But as I amended the post to read, I actually believe this is mealy bug.
 
solid7 said:
 
The messy shit that they make.
.
If it doesn't look exactly like something that you've seen, remember that there are dozens of species of whitefly.
.
But as I amended the post to read, I actually believe this is mealy bug.
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     I didn't know whiteflies left honeydew like aphids. Interesting. They suck and they just got one rank grosser in my book.
     One species or another always gets my tomatoes every year. Never in really high numbers though,  so I've never noticed or looked for honeydew.
 
Hybrid_Mode_01 said:
 
     I didn't know whiteflies left honeydew like aphids. Interesting. They suck and they just got one rank grosser in my book.
     One species or another always gets my tomatoes every year. Never in really high numbers though,  so I've never noticed or looked for honeydew.
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You know, now that you mention it, I mistook the pictures to be from the OP - but they weren't. (my bad)
.
Whiteflies do crap some stickly liquid all over leaves underneath where they are perched, and it grows sooty mildew.  So, you get these gross cottony strands on the plant, and then a layer of disgusting mildew underneath them.  I don't know if that's what you'd call honeydew, but before it starts to mold up, it definitely has a sheen about it.  Makes the leaves look like they've been lightly sprayed.
 
      Now that you mention it, some of my lower leaves on more crowded plants do sometimes show sooty mold. I chalked it up to humidity and did some pruning. Funny how those couple of whiteflies always seemed to be hanging out in the moldy spots. :think: :banghead:
 
Sorry I hadn't replied to this sooner. I managed to find some bugs of some sort on my plant. I think they may be the culprit of the white sugar substance on the leaves. It also appears that they are on my new plants for this season as well. Possibly from some bags of dirt that I brought in that I stored from last season. I used the potting mix on all my seedlings, when transplanting, and to top up the dirt in my chocolate habanero plants pail. Here are some pictures that I managed to take shots of. I rinsed off the big plant in the tub, but I think it may require some soap or predator to get rid of them.
 
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shaggs2riches said:
Sorry I hadn't replied to this sooner. I managed to find some bugs of some sort on my plant. I think they may be the culprit of the white sugar substance on the leaves. It also appears that they are on my new plants for this season as well. Possibly from some bags of dirt that I brought in that I stored from last season. I used the potting mix on all my seedlings, when transplanting, and to top up the dirt in my chocolate habanero plants pail. Here are some pictures that I managed to take shots of. I rinsed off the big plant in the tub, but I think it may require some soap or predator to get rid of them.
 
20170410_214301.jpg

20170410_214648.jpg

20170411_174202.jpg

0a0f3362-d47c-4667-be27-8f2c8dbb23ae.jpg

20170410_214941.jpg

fa5df3cb-cd4e-4630-beb2-fc20a176f29a.jpg
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Psyllids!!!! 
I know them well...very well actually. 
They are one of the worst pests to deal with. IMO rivaled only by broad mites. 
 
if you look closley at the edges of leaves & undersides you will see little yellow/orange spots almost attached by little strings.
Those are the eggs. The eggs then turn into the scale like insect which do the most damage. They suck the sap of the plant and give it incurable diseases (psyllid yellows, once its set in there is no going back)
Then finally the scale insects turn into those little flies, which lay the eggs and the cycle is complete.
 
Iv had a good few years to come up with a game plan for these guys..the first year I got them was a write off but slowly iv figured out how to deal with them.
 
The best product I have found for these is a product which we call "super shield". Its active ingredient is something called " tau-fluvalinate"   . So I would suggest you try to track down an insecticide containing that and proceed with nuclear war. You will need to spray / kill the scale stage with the insecticide. Then you will need to repeat in a week once the eggs that are currently laid hatch. You need to stop the cycles.
 
You will never get rid of them otherwise. Infact i doubt you will completely get rid of them. You will probably be able to "manage" them only.  
Best of luck. Happy to answer any question on these beasties...they can pretty much always be found on my plants in some capacity.
 
edit; that white stuff is known as "honey dew" or "psyllid sugars" its a sticky sugar like substance which the psyllids excrete which ants etc find attractive. If left on the plants it will turn into sooty mold (black mold, which is another problem). So make sure you clean off what you can.  
 
http://cropwatch.unl.edu/scouting-and-managing-potato-psyllids-and-psyllid-yellows-unl-cropwatch-june-16-2011
 
http://www.bioforce.co.nz/pests/Psyllids.html
 
 
 
 
Powelly said:
Next growing season I am going to proactively spray my plants with neem weekly no matter how they look
This forum is 90% insect horror show pictures
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I treat 2-3 times in the summer with Azamax. Probably spray everything down before plant out and a few times after. Best product i've ever used. 
 
D3monic said:
 
I treat 2-3 times in the summer with Azamax. Probably spray everything down before plant out and a few times after. Best product i've ever used. 
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The repeated and continuous use of pesticides based on the same active ingredient belonging to the same family and to the same chemical group greatly favors the development of resistant pest populations. As a result, pesticides are becoming less and less effective, and pest population densities are increasing, leading to an additional need for pesticides.
 
shaggs2riches said:
Would ladybugs and lacewings be able to take care of them? I was thinking of ordering some to let loose in my greenhouse once it is warm enough to bring them in there.
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No.
 
I have dealt with hundreds of plants with them by now. It sucks but take note of what I wrote above.
 
Im not familiar with Azamax but I hear good things about it. It may work. I have first hand experience with what I suggested though on the pest you have, with about a hundred examples.
Listen to experience, or don't.
 
Here's a pic I snapped of some of them on one my plants this morning. 
They are pretty much always there now. Can only really control them. If you dont control them your plants die.
 
IMG_2988_zpsnwjbffki.jpg

 
 
 
 
 
 
I checked out Azamax and I will try to order some, if I can't fiND it locally. I went through what I had on hand, and I had half a bottle of concentrate Bug B Gone ecosence insecticidal soap. I also found a bottle of neem oil in our medicine cabinet. It is the same as this stuff...
https://www.iherb.com/pr/organix-south-theraneem-organix-neem-oil-1-fl-oz-30-ml/17725

Would that neem oil be anyway helpful? Also how would one go about mixing it up to use? I have 70 plants one month away from going in the garden. I took a look at my plants this evening,and it looks like a bit of sooty mould is starting to develop. I picked a couple leaves off that had it, but they will be needing a thorough cleaning tomorrow. It's funny because I really didn't see anything the other day when I watered them. Until I get something better, I need to try with what I got or can get real fast. This seems a lot worse of trouble than aphids ever were.
 
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