Caffeine

[Fenris]

I read an article on Wikipedia a couple of weeks ago on Caffeine and it mentioned how good it was at inhibiting parasites and bugs on the plant.

I have a few plants that seem to have spidermite infestations that I cant seem to get rid of. I tried using some pyrethrum/white oil spray from Bunnings but it destroys the prickly poppies which are in the same pot as the Lions tail which has the infestation. I also have some salvia seedlings that are starting to suffer.

Will a cup of instant coffee sprayed on the leaves kill off the bugs and leave my plants healthy.

I did try garlic which helps but is not the most preferable. Although it doesn't kill my plants.

How good is caffeine as a bugicide?

[Torsten]

How good is caffeine as a bugicide?

Great for soft critters, but useless for hard ones.

[Fenris]

Does soft include red spider mites? And is coffee at drinking strength safe or does it need to watered down?

[Torsten]

Does soft include red spider mites? And is coffee at drinking strength safe or does it need to watered down?

Don't know about spider mites. I only use it on snails. But it does work on many others too.

I water it down quite a bit. Drinking strength would make a bit of a mess.

[cisumevil]

For you Sipder Mites try this.......

2lts of warm water

6 x cloves of garlic (Crushed)

2-3 HOT chillies (Crushed)

2 x tablespoons of Olive Oil

1/2 a cup of Lux (Soap flakes)

Mix up really well until all the Soap flakes are disolved, then fill up a Spray bottle with 50% mix & 50% water and shake really well!

Give the mites a good spraying then in 2 hours give a good spraying with just 100% water and repete until no more mites!

If it's a really, really bad attack I use abit of neem oil on them also!

[amanito]

I'll probably be selling caffeine hcl in bulk at 12 euro for 100 gr or so in the near future.

[devance]

Chalk that been fire heated to crack the shells [anchient calcium forming organisms as in the white cliffs of Dover/England]so that it get in breathing legs of insect and a bit of boron powder has a amaszing abilty to repulse ants .

They don't come back. Ever.

A product ever in demand supply, although simple to make.. Really good for chalking around a pet food tray. Just needs one time,.

Don't know about flying insects.

[naja naja]

I'll probably be selling caffeine hcl in bulk at 12 euro for 100 gr or so in the near future.

How do u rekon the law would view the personal importation of a hundred g of caffine into Oz?

Edited September 29, 2006 by naja naja

[Torsten]

I'll be selling caffeine in small units (a few g) pretty soon. just have to catch up on some other packaging matters first.

won't be selling bulk amounts though.

[naja naja]

Sweet!

[_e_]

on a strange tangent, here in sweden they have 'caffeine eye drops'.

is this a relatively new phenomena or are people familiar with this method of ingestion?

[Stonehenge]

Diatomaceous earth is very good for crawling insects including ants. Sprinkle it on the soil surface. Ants tend to bring aphids and other things with them to farm on your plants. For mites I use Safer's soap though I'm not sure they have it down in Oz. Probably regular soap will do the job.

[Evil Genius]

Hi cisumevil,

i´ve just tried your recipe on some of my plants. uuuh, it smells so terrible nasty in my house now. I probably will never be able to convince girl coming to my place again. It Smells like i live in a Kebap Store. But i have the feeling they look much better now. How long is a normal treatment time?A few days, Weeks or Months? I don´t want any of these spider mite bitches to survive but they are so small. Thanks. bye EG

[Fenris]

I had 2 seedlings both I think were Salvia coccinea and one got infected with spidermites so I sprayed it with commercial bug repellant and it destroyed all the foliage. My clean seedling was looking healthy and it had reached about 6 inches tall and my dog ate it . I still have problems with spidermites on the smaller one which stopped growing at about 3 inches and looks very sick regardless of the ammount of garlic I drench it in. As it is small and a bit sad for itself I decided to remove the spidermites by hand using scotch sticky tape and gently pressing each leaf on the sticky then gently removing. I did this for each leaf and then redosed with a new batch of garlic.

There were a lot of either eggs or very small mites on the underside of the leaf and only visible on the tape and it worked well at removing them. Its probably not the best use of your time to use a sticky paper lint remover on the plants but for some applications it could have its benefits.

[Evil Genius]

Hi Fenris,

i had very good results using pure Kali-soap(I don´t know the Englisch word) and ethanol for killing spiderbitches. 5g Kalisoap and 70 ml Ethanol is enough for making about 1 L Water. Allegedly this stuff is also allowed for organical growing but i don´t have further informations about that and i don´t know if this is true. bye EG

[AndyAmine.]

Any reason you couldnt jst use crushed up 'No-Doze' caffine tablets?

Maybe soak them in warm water then filter with coffee filters to get the gak out, or put the powder in some emptied out tea bags and soak.

I find the most effective things for spidermite is daily spraying with water, they hate it and bugger off pretty quick., the first couple of times use the squirter nozle not the mister, to really knock them off.

This has the added plus of not killing of beneficial critters at the same time.

Edited November 23, 2006 by AndyAmine.

[BlackDragon]

"spiderbitches", Im sure they are the most hated insects on the planet!! I had to pull out my big b.aurea due to summertime "spiderbitchfests". I blood hate em.

[Qhorakuna tantani]

Depending on the price, beneficial bugs can be a viable option. It also depends on where your plants are and other factors, but they can be quite effective. There are a few that are fairly specific to red and two spotted spiderbitches, and are sold by companies in Australia. I've been meaning to try them for a long time, just never got around to it.

[-bijanto-]

Try neem oil.

[AndyAmine.]

Unless your prepaired to spend up big on beneficial bugs so you get enough for a critical mass in your garden or are ok with lots of reaplication they tend to only be usful in enclosed spaces like hydro setups.

I belive Torsten has some going well at Wandjina though?

When we got a heap of new mulch in the other month and it came infested with these red backed flying bettles (anyone know what they are) that love to eat most of my nasties.. you can see them there, sitting on the leaves sticking thier proboscis into the little fuckers.. I receive much joy from watching this.. hehehe.

[AndyAmine.]

Try neem oil.

I tried out some Neem oil recently but damn does it stink and its so hard to get off your skin, I stank for 1/2 the day. this doesnt bother you guys at all?

I have similar problems using Chili/Garlic mix's. Phoooooowwwwiiieeeeee.... that smells.

[Qhorakuna tantani]

I'm cheering, I've seen quite a few green and brown lacewings and their eggs and larvae around my place. It is a wonderful sight watching aphids having their insides sucked out and used as camo

[Qhorakuna tantani]

Just thought this fits here.

Found this little guy today, or should I say lady.

[gerbil]

I tried out some Neem oil recently but damn does it stink and its so hard to get off your skin, I stank for 1/2 the day. this doesnt bother you guys at all?

I have similar problems using Chili/Garlic mix's. Phoooooowwwwiiieeeeee.... that smells.

Andy you shouldn't be spraying when it's windy, no matter what the substance is; spray on a cool, calm day and you'll get no drift, or at least that's the theory. None of the substance should get on your skin!:D

Edited November 24, 2006 by gerbil

[planthelper]

I find the most effective things for spidermite is daily spraying with water, they hate it and bugger off pretty quick., the first couple of times use the squirter nozle not the mister, to really knock them off.

i second this methode!!!