Hi fellow Gardeners,
Today we got bit, literally, by the bugs for the first significant time!
Aphids Attack
One of the things that we’ve been very lucky to not have experienced is an attack of bugs on our plants. We’ve had some stuff get chewed by a rogue bug or two but nothing too crazy.
The other day when I went onto the deck to water the plants and have a look around at the progress of the stuff I made the unfortunate discovery that we’ve been attacked! It was thankfully just one kale plant but it was still a blow to my ego lol. We’ve been lucky this is the first time it happened!
When I first saw it I wasn’t sure what was going on. I saw a bunch of stuff that was powdery white that was falling down to the dirt below the kale leaves and I thought that was odd. I was looking up what could be causing that since I didn’t take a really close look at it. Looking online I didn’t see specifically what it was so I went back to the plant and had a closer look. Looking closer I could see that it was bugs not a powder! My mind instantly went to ticks since that’s what these things look like but thankfully it wasn’t that. They just seem to be aphids. I’ve seen an aphid or two crawling on the plants and it’s not bothered me too much but when I saw the swarm of them on our stuff I was mad! I found a link to a site that gave me the info that confirmed they were indeed aphids, link below.
https://www.smartgardener.com/plants/61-kale-lacinato/diseases/781-powdery-mildew
These little shits were all over it! I was impressed that they took the plant over and I was none the wiser until just then. I guess they like to hide on the underside of the leaves for the most part but they seemed to have eaten all of that so they came out in force now! I think there were thousands of the little things on there lol. Various stages of the life cycle but quite a bit of adults and babies!
I moved the other kale plant away from this one and put it next to the marigold plant. I’ve read that marigolds are good at keeping aphids away and thankfully we have one on our deck! Next year we will plant more of them so that we will line the four corners of the deck with them, if we are still living here.
I was going to see what I can do to remove them without ruining the plant but there were too many and that would be all I could think of if I tried eating the kale. Am I eating a mouthful of aphids right now?! Lol. Not sure if I would be able to eat the kale at that point honestly!
What’s your gardening situation like? I’d love to hear if you have had any critters like this attacking your stuff and how you dealt with it!
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Hope your kale will get better.
This one was doomed lol I threw it away into the compost pile a few hundred feet away. Thankfully with the other kale it's not been attacked by bugs yet! Hopefully we can keep it that way lol
Oh no!! Hoping for a good and stable journey with your other kale. 🤞🏼💚
Lol the gif champion!
Whoah! That's a lot of aphids on one plant! We've had them before in our garden as well, but not as much. Nothing that knocking off with a stick wont handle. Hehe
Yeah I was very confused at what was going on! I originally thought it was some type of mold or something because it was so widespread. Then I looked closer and was like holy shit that's a lot of bugs! Lol. It was literally a whole colony it was terrible. Threw that stalk of kale in the compost pile hundreds of feet away in hopes they don't come back lol. I guess aphids don't like marigold flowers so we've got one plant or marigolds that we got and we will be keeping the kale as close to that as we can!
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That's awesome thank you I appreciate it!
https://www.naturesgoodguys.com/collections/beneficial-nematodes
Hose end sprayer for nematodes
Filtered water. Apply at night or morning. Water in deep to soil and on plants.
Thanks that’s a good tip, I wonder if it’s helpful for potted plants since we don’t have a hose. I’ll look it up for next year, the growing season is nearly over here sadly!
You don't need a hose. Just make sure that whatever your use to apply nematodes meets the psi requirements and that there isn't a screen. In potted plants its easier to saturate the soil and more ideal in ways for survival because soil/environmental conditions are stable typically ie soil temps stay below 90°.
Chapin also has a nice hand held sprayer also similar products.
https://chapinmfg.com/collections/handheld-sprayer/products/chapin-1002-48-ounce-multi-purpose-sprayer
Nematodes also helps with nutrient uptake.
That's awesome thanks for the info! I'm going to look up exactly what nematodes are. I remember hearing the name from an old cartoon or something but I don't know what they are. Glad to know they help with nutrients as well! Seem like versatile creatures!
I looked up nematodes and they are kind of like little tiny worms. That's cool! I'm going to try and use that next year as a preventative measure in the plants. I want to get good at using bigger pots but also introduce some small worms as well to help move the soil around.
They are microscopic and works pretty much instantly
Yeah that's great, I see that they are popular among gardens to control aphids.
Ew yuck. That's rough. I assume bugs are super common though. Hopefully the marigold flowers work.
They work great it seems but this kale here wasn't near it so that didn't help lol. Moved the other one next to the marigolds now!
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That's a common pest in kale and a sign that they are water stressed. I up my watering and the aphids usually get eaten by a small hoverfly that likes to visit and clean my plants. I'd say that you need to get the plants into bigger pots so that the roots are cooler and water more frequently
Thanks for dropping by with some wisdom! That's awesome to hear. They are probably water stressed indeed, we typically only give them a good watering once a day due to my work schedule and all that. I work remotely and the plants are right outside my office on the deck so I can't have the little man always helping me. We got some great watering in the month of July with all the rain but when it didn't rain we would water it once. I know the tomatoes weren't thrilled by it but we do what we gotta do lol. Thankfully I water them well when I do and haven't forgotten a day.
The pots are probably an issue as well, they are about 12 inches around and maybe 8-10 inches tall? I'm not sure but we got them for free at a farm event where the kids planted stuff. We've learned a lot this summer with the plant garden we have! It's the biggest one we've had yet and has come with some challenges but the aphids are our first pest.
That does sound too small for kale roots to grow adequately