Hi, I have noticed on my indoor plants that they have a white cotton like fluff on the new growth, and in between stem and leaf, I was wondering if anyone know what it is?, as it seems to kill off my new growth.. and nothing seems to kill it apart from me going around and wiping it off. I'm pretty sure it is not mealy bugs.. Please help Ell
I've had mealybugs on my outdoor plants and it just doesn't look the same and there sticky and a lot more fluffy..
If it is mealybug hows the best way to kill them?? I've tried everything. I don't want anything with to much chemicals as I have an indoor cat.
There are multiple species of mealybugs; they wouldn't all look exactly the same. You've tried everything? What, specifically?
Light soap and water, flour and water, sprays (can't remember all the names) but a fair few that are for mealybugs, the only thing that seems to work is me going along and pulling them off. I've just wiped banana skin on all my hoya's I was told that, that would help the plant fight but not sure if its going to work.
My usual remedy for mealybugs is to throw the plant out if it's a large infestation. If it's a small infestation, I isolate the plant, wipe off all leaf and stem surfaces I can reach with rubbing alcohol and paper towels (rubbing alcohol and Q-Tips if the plant has lots of crevices where bugs could lay eggs or hide; just spray heavily with rubbing alcohol if the leaves are too small or delicate to hand-wipe); repeat every 3-4 days, and continue for a couple weeks after you see the last one. Particularly stubborn infestations may require hand-wiping with rubbing alcohol, then spraying with rubbing alcohol, then spraying with a pesticide (according to label directions, and outdoors): mealybugs are more pesticide-resistant than a lot of pests because they have a white, waxy, water-repellent coating that makes it difficult to actually reach the insect with the poison. Rubbing alcohol will partly dissolve the wax, so spraying with rubbing alcohol first will soften them up a bit and make the pesticide more effective. It can be done, but depending on the size of the plant and severity of the infestation, it may be a very long-term project; I once took a year and a half to completely eliminate mealybugs from a couple tall cacti I own. I've never heard of the flour-and-water approach before, or the banana-skin option either.
