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A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

wildlife, gardening, environment, Rural living, Pets and Vets
malakoffee
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A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406018

Postby malakoffee » April 22nd, 2021, 8:01 am

. . . . the little devils were decimating my fruit trees last year. I bought a spray but the aphids had already curled the leaves into protective bundles . . . .

I have a remaining mosquito coil ( ex-camping )- for producing permethrin-laden smoke.

Methinks a large plastic bag over a ( small ) tree + smoking coil within might smoke the devil out / kill them.

I won't be doing that until the blossoms have gone as I don't want to harm any pollinators.

What could possibly go wrong ?

Urbandreamer
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406030

Postby Urbandreamer » April 22nd, 2021, 8:49 am

malakoffee wrote:. . . . the little devils were decimating my fruit trees last year. I bought a spray but the aphids had already curled the leaves into protective bundles . . . .

I have a remaining mosquito coil ( ex-camping )- for producing permethrin-laden smoke.

Methinks a large plastic bag over a ( small ) tree + smoking coil within might smoke the devil out / kill them.

I won't be doing that until the blossoms have gone as I don't want to harm any pollinators.

What could possibly go wrong ?


Plastic is flamible and moves with the breeze, possible problem if the coil causes it to catch fire.

Talking "slightly mad" ideas, I did see someone on TV allowing parsnips to grow into their second year deliberatly because black fly and aphids love them. They claimed that the abundent insect food source lead to a large source of aphid preditors which kept nearby plants aphid free. It was easy for them as they grew parsnips and simply left a few each year for the following year.

Arborbridge
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406033

Postby Arborbridge » April 22nd, 2021, 9:02 am

Urbandreamer wrote:
malakoffee wrote:. . . . the little devils were decimating my fruit trees last year. I bought a spray but the aphids had already curled the leaves into protective bundles . . . .

I have a remaining mosquito coil ( ex-camping )- for producing permethrin-laden smoke.

Methinks a large plastic bag over a ( small ) tree + smoking coil within might smoke the devil out / kill them.

I won't be doing that until the blossoms have gone as I don't want to harm any pollinators.

What could possibly go wrong ?


Plastic is flamible and moves with the breeze, possible problem if the coil causes it to catch fire.

Talking "slightly mad" ideas, I did see someone on TV allowing parsnips to grow into their second year deliberatly because black fly and aphids love them. They claimed that the abundent insect food source lead to a large source of aphid preditors which kept nearby plants aphid free. It was easy for them as they grew parsnips and simply left a few each year for the following year.



I think I saw something of the sort on Gardener's world. I am sceptical that nature works that way for if there's an abundant food source, more will procreate and then just move on to the other crops. As for their predators: they never eat 'em all but always leave some for later!

THere was another type of garden who actually tolerated aphids on the grounds that they are part of the overall food chain - she was essentially trying to follow a wild gardening ethos. When I talk about keeping a small corner of the garden for wild flowers, letting the grass grow or even nettles to encourage inspects, I am firmly told by my wife I can think again. "NOT in my garden".

Arb.

88V8
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406036

Postby 88V8 » April 22nd, 2021, 9:18 am

malakoffee wrote:.Methinks a large plastic bag over a ( small ) tree + smoking coil within might smoke the devil out / kill them.

One can buy insecticide smokes on eBay.

I've used them, although not in this way.
Little heat, much smoke, would probably work. Might need more than one to go off at once, depending on size.

What sort of tree?

V8

malakoffee
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406052

Postby malakoffee » April 22nd, 2021, 9:49 am

I try to be tolerant of the place of all things in the garden, but the fruit trees were pretty devastated and sickly last year.

Cox : Egremont Russet : Plum (somesort)

The two blackcurrants were affected , but not too badly.

All of the above aphid attacks were farmed by ants.
This year I have sticky grease-bands around the trunk bases.

I have wild flower areas : surrounding the fruit trees and not far away from the blackcurrants . .. . but the aphids are winning.

Thanks for the Ebay tipoff.

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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406076

Postby sg31 » April 22nd, 2021, 10:49 am

malakoffee wrote:
All of the above aphid attacks were farmed by ants.
This year I have sticky grease-bands around the trunk bases.



I had the same problem last year and bought grease bands to stop the ants. I spent a pleasant hour watching them find out about grease bands. After the first few got stuck they milled around for a while looking for an alternative route. I'd carefully sited the bands to stop that (don't forget to band any tree stake), they tried climbing over the top of their fallen comrades....and got stuck further on.

A couple of days later they had sacrificed enough of their number to have created stepping stones over the grease band and normal service was resumed.

You can't stop ants, you can slow them down but they always win in the end.....so far.

UncleEbenezer
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#406635

Postby UncleEbenezer » April 24th, 2021, 12:23 pm

Arborbridge wrote:When I talk about keeping a small corner of the garden for wild flowers, letting the grass grow or even nettles to encourage inspects, I am firmly told by my wife I can think again. "NOT in my garden".

Arb.

You may need to spin a different story. Not grass: it's a total thug (you won't get rid of it, but don't emphaisise it), but emphasise some of the prettier meadow flowers, and whatever wildlife turns her on - bees, butterflies, birds, ...

As for nettles? If you have a garden, you must surely grow at least some food crops. Nettles are vigorous enough to share between the butterflies and your own kitchen!

malakoffee
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#445562

Postby malakoffee » September 27th, 2021, 11:53 am

A bit of feedback - while I remember :-

Smoking the fruit trees ( with permethrin coils ) :-
=====================================
This appears to have worked well, using a few smoking sessions for each tree - spaced out over the summer.

Any aphid/other attacks were swiftly diminished, keeping the trees in good condition.

Neighbours wondered whether I had gone even-more-nuts, but related that it was a bad year for aphids on their fruit trees.

Highly targeted application and time-limited exposure . . . . I'm hoping that it isn't significantly environmentally damaging.

Grease bands & freehand grease on tree trunks
=====================================
I have a pleasing memory of watching an ant, with a aphid nymph in its mandibles, desperately trying to get past the grease barrier . . . to start an aphid farm up the tree.

In summary, I kept the ants off the trees for most of the summer ( as long as it mattered ).
This required regular monitoring and several reapplications of grease.
Quite a faff, but certainly worthwhile. It worked.

sg31
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#445862

Postby sg31 » September 28th, 2021, 11:47 am

malakoffee wrote:A bit of feedback - while I remember :-

Smoking the fruit trees ( with permethrin coils ) :-
=====================================
This appears to have worked well, using a few smoking sessions for each tree - spaced out over the summer.

Any aphid/other attacks were swiftly diminished, keeping the trees in good condition.

Neighbours wondered whether I had gone even-more-nuts, but related that it was a bad year for aphids on their fruit trees.

Highly targeted application and time-limited exposure . . . . I'm hoping that it isn't significantly environmentally damaging.



I've never heard of permethrin coils. Please explain exactly how you used them on the trees.

Dod101
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#445878

Postby Dod101 » September 28th, 2021, 12:09 pm

malakoffee wrote:A bit of feedback - while I remember :-

Smoking the fruit trees ( with permethrin coils ) :-
=====================================
This appears to have worked well, using a few smoking sessions for each tree - spaced out over the summer.

Any aphid/other attacks were swiftly diminished, keeping the trees in good condition.

Neighbours wondered whether I had gone even-more-nuts, but related that it was a bad year for aphids on their fruit trees.

Highly targeted application and time-limited exposure . . . . I'm hoping that it isn't significantly environmentally damaging.

Grease bands & freehand grease on tree trunks
=====================================
I have a pleasing memory of watching an ant, with a aphid nymph in its mandibles, desperately trying to get past the grease barrier . . . to start an aphid farm up the tree.

In summary, I kept the ants off the trees for most of the summer ( as long as it mattered ).
This required regular monitoring and several reapplications of grease.
Quite a faff, but certainly worthwhile. It worked.


Very enterprising. We used to use these coils in Hong Kong to keep away mosquitoes (you can now get an electric version). Evil smelling and horrible that they were they were effective. For the benefit of sq31 they are coils which just gently release a horrible smoke which certainly repels mosquitos and most other forms of life. How to use them for trees? Well that is up to the OP to explain.

Dod

malakoffee
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#445988

Postby malakoffee » September 28th, 2021, 4:20 pm

sg31 wrote:I've never heard of permethrin coils. Please explain exactly how you used them on the trees.


a.k.a Mosquito coils - sold by camping equipment shops, etc.
Used for warding off mosquitoes, biting midges and other hungry insects.

My fruit trees are around six feet high and can be covered by a big, robust plastic bag ( which previously covered my new mattress, as delivered. )

1) Arrange an ad-hoc, tripod of hazel poles over the target tree. Peg the bottom of the poles into the ground - to prevent the wind gusts from toppling the "tent".

2) Carefully place the big, mattress bag over the tree & tripod. Pull the plastic down to ground level to ensure minimal smoke loss.

3) Place a lit mosquito coil within the tent - ensuring it cannot set the plastic on fire or damage the tree.

4) Give it an hour of smoke.

5) Remove the coil. Remove the plastic bag & tripod.

. . . . I think I'm going to have to beg, from the bed shop, for a king-sized mattress bag for next year.

sg31
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Re: A slightly mad idea for suppressing aphids

#446048

Postby sg31 » September 28th, 2021, 6:15 pm

Thank you for the detailed reply. Very interesting. It should work on my small cherry trees, the plums are getting just a bit large for this treatment now and the bramley is way too big.

I'll keep my eyes open for suitably sized bags.


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