I just noticed tiny quick crawling bugs in my soil but none on seedling. What can I put in my soil that’s not poison?
These types of bugs are typically the result of overwatering. Be sure to let your soil dry out between waterings.
That said, Capt Jacks Deadbug is an effective spray for your plant, but it shouldn’t be poured in your soil. Mosquito Bits or diatomaceous earth are good options.
3 Likes
Thanks Midwest Guy, I just put some DE in and worked it in to the top half inch
of soil hopefully that works. Not sure what they are, extremely small and move pretty quickly but only in the soil. Are they some kind of mite?
1 Like
Can you share pics?
1 Like
I can try, hard to see.
1 Like
It’s the gray thing. Probably 1/4 dia. of a small needle. Isn’t there any kind of natural soil drench that would kill them?
After doing some more research they appear to be beneficial soil mites or possibly springtails. I think they may be too small for springtails though.
That wet soil enables them to thrive. Let that soil dry out before watering again.
2 Likes
Yeah I had a humidity dome on as well so that’s the plan for now. Just got second set of leaves out so humidity dome is coming off and going to let her dry out, the DE will probably slow them down as well. Thanks again.
If you are using a humidity dome the soil should be completely dry. Choose one (watering or dome) and stick with it. Doing both will cause problems.
1 Like
Question, are your plants sick or do they suddenly look different?
DE won’t do much good if it’s wet. Most pests breath through their legs, and DE is a fine dust that basically chokes and dries them out. Wet DE will have almost no effect.
1 Like
Captin Jaks! Spray only at dusk tho, seriously if you do not want bugs you need to use Captain Jack’s pick a day of the week at dusk always at dusk you don’t want it to sit on your plants and burn make them curl and die the leaves not the plant, spray at dusk and then you spray as needed when it gets towards the end I spray once a week I don’t want those suckers going into the buds and camping out and destroying the whole thing
The plant look fine, the bugs are in the soil only and it’s not that wet. Removed the humidity dome and turned on the exhaust fan. It will be dry by tomorrow.
What worked for me: nematodes and yellow sticky paper. If they are fungus gnarts that is. It literally disappeared a couple of days after I applied the nematodes to the soil with 1 litre of water. I used a 1 million nemadote pack, my pot is 15L. Meantime the sticky paper caught all adults. Happy days. Note that the nematodes won’t affect your plant at all they are just some microscopic roundworms that feed on the fungus gnarts larvae, so I can’t see a reason to use anything else.