Hi folks... I found this forum while searching for information on insecticidal soap and alternatives. I have a cycad which has a horrendous scale infestation. I've used Safers and Green Earth insecticidal soaps. I've soaked the whole plant in a bucket of soapy water in the past. The usual routine at the moment is, put it in the shower, spray spray spray, wipe as much of the scale off under the spray as I can get or until I'm soaked and my back gives out... let it dry a bit and then spray with insecticidal soap. Within a week or so, it's covered again. It seems impossible to get ALL of them. Of course it's making the usual mess around the plant. A few orchids which have never been near the cycad have some scale but I've been able to keep that manageable by washing/wiping/picking off. I should just chuck the cycad. But I've had it for many years, and, well, it's a *cycad*! I'd like to save it. Somehow, it still gets new leaves now & then. Is there anything systemic I can put on it that would poison the scale? Anything better than insecticidal soap? I'm reluctant to use anything super toxic -- for my own health as much as my cat's! Also, being in the middle of nowhere, I currently only have access to whatever Home Hardware sells or what can be ordered online. Advice? Please and thank you :)
I think scale is particularly difficult because the insects are under the scales, so you have to pull off all of those and then wash and wipe. And then next week (I don't actually know the time frame, but a week sounds right from what you've said), any eggs left behind will hatch, so you have to do that routine at least a few times even if you did get all the live insects, right away when each new batch appears, before they hatch any new generations. Of course, the cycad has what, several hundred or thousand leaflets with crevices for scale insects and eggs to hide in, so it seems like an impossible task to me. But if you want to do it, you have to consider it at least a three-week job, with then constant vigilance so you can attack any new outcrop immediately.
Thanks for the reply.... It doesn't actually have that many leaves. Probably thanks to poor growth from the scale, and more being broken from the wiping/spraying. Several dozen leaflets. Does anyone know if they make something systemic for scale...?