Gorilla.

[Dinafem-Mark]

@2Fat2EatThat Sorry to hear about the "borg" aka thrip attack mate

 

Best to get the little buggers under control as you know they can be a real pain and not really manageable only eliminated 

 

Keep up the good fight buddy and I hope things are going well?

 

All the best 

 

Mark..

[2Fat2EatThat]

Hello growers, 

 

This was my first grow returning back to the fold and I think some of my grow senses were slow to emerge from my hibernation as its been a roller-coaster ride of emotions.

Growing can be and is so simple in essence but your always limited by your knowledge bank. No matter how much you might research in advance and attempt to fix issues, if you don't fully understand what your doing growing will find you out and rub your nose in its shit. If your honest with yourself and accept your own limitations you can turn a negative experience into a positive one for the future.

With all those lovely modern mindfulness based thoughts I've created above its actually been a bastarding fucking shit twatting cock bollocks couple of weeks since my last update and its not my fault, it is, well maybe equally, hmmm ok ok it was probably my fucking fault! 

It turned out I had a massive Thrip invasion, those bastard sneaky little immigrants found their way into my grow space and laid waste to my plants. I admit its probably from me starting and leaving them on the window sill for a good few weeks whilst slowly building a home for them live in and one or two of them found their way in.


This is how it went down in the hood from that point -

I first saw a few tiny silver looking spots randomly on a couple of leaves. I watched and waited as initially it didn't give any sign of having any effect negatively.

Then I noticed all my plants were beginning to develop them equally and then began yellowing low down which threw me a bit. Initially my thoughts were it may be because I was feeding a blanket nute mix to them using my old nutes from before my hibernation that may have been past it or an issue with eggs in new compost or water maybe.

So to start I bought new nutes and used at the same levels that made zero difference to the problem but I did burn my plants quite extensively So yes the nutes were probably way past it and were to strong at those levels when new.

Then I went through the common curitive processes namely Epsom Salt, doses of Seaweed, fed them teas of fresh nettle tops, comfrey with molasses,v'v'light top dress of Bat Guano all of which kept me busy but gave no improvement to the extensive spotting although the green bits got greener which meant my "treatments" were delivering as they should do they were just no use against the enemy I didn't know I had at that point. 

After all of that in quite a short time frame the plants were frozen and stressed as the leaves were now dying back more but as luck would have it that's when I spotted a similar problem online described amongst others as "silver spots" and the crawling little feckers that caused them.

 

Here's a leaf with the silver spots, they look white in the shot but in the right light are definitely silver (from different plant) -

 

 

Here's the same leaf with a Thrip just chillin' on its underside -

 

Thrip focused battle commences -

My first response, as it was quite early flowering, was to remove pretty much all vegetation to limit housing space for the little critters. It's lollipoping as some do anyway but I now think that it may have added alot of extra stress to them as my Moby Dick faltered after that and hasn't recovered like my Gorilla.

I then bought some nice organic Neem Oil, a fat bag of DE (Diatomaceous Earth) that looked like a 5kg block of coke (not that I know of course) and initially I made a strong emulsion of both in water mixed with a little dish soap to disperse the oil through the water.

As the little fuckers munched and slept I mixed my weapons and laid out my dastardly plan to attack at dawn with cold fury and furious rage in my misting bottle trigger finger. I slept fitfully dreaming of victory. 

At dawn (lights on) all plants were removed from the danger area, I switched of the power to confuse any bugs (or lessen my risk of electrocution, btw I didn't spray the lights I'm not that stupid! ) and I coated my whole space in the sticky spray that as it dries leaves a thin film of Neem holding some DE every where. I went round twice like that and sprayed all round my tough tray then sealed it up and banged the lights on for an hour to dry it right out.

To the plants themselves I squirted every pot and compost surface liberally. I then took some pure Neem oil and rubbed some on every open stem section, branch, trunk and dusted those oily patches with DE like a micro barbed wire for them to travel over on their way to Thrip heaven which I believe is in the EU somewhere near Brussels.

I then used a brush with the emulsion and literally hand painted every leaf under and over with it and as close to the buds as possible without touching them as I'm pretty sure vaped Neem Oil tastes as bad as it smells or as my son described it and I quote "it's like one of mum's weird veg curries dad"

Back to the compost, I made a runny paste with DE and water that I squirted over the surface. The DE as well as defeating most bugs also does wonders for your plants and grow health in general. It has way to many uses to list here but read this short article for the headlines - https://www.maximumyield.com/the-many-ways-to-use-diatomaceous-earth-in-the-garden/2/3656

I've repeated that a few times now and will carry on doing so every few days but I'm relatively sure I've stopped the main onslaught now and I have had some spot free growth across the surviving my plants.


My poor old plants have taken a real hammering and I lost a few along the way but my mighty Gorilla has scraped through looking battle hardened, burnt, crinkly and beaten to a pulp but has began to push on with flowering again. I've continued with the Epsom, Seaweed etc as it can only help them recover and I have turned the dial back on the fresh nutes now.

Shes not looking pretty but my Gorilla is building up sugar on her leaves again and the buds are filling out now, if you look close you can still see the little silver scars in her leaves, here she is -

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A couple of shots with flash just to show the sparkly sugar -

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

You can see from her odd shaped twisted leaves that she's been proper stressed in many ways but I'm hoping as she progresses with some love she may calm down and  fill out better.


With plenty of attention I think I'm on top of it but as I didn't want to put any new plants in to flower whilst I scratched my head trying to fix things its forced me to build a separate vegging space under my main flowering bench so I can now keep a group vegging and training rather than bang them in from seed as I planned so a positive outcome again.

Conclusions - 

 

After a somewhat dozy return to my favourite and only hobby that I can do, I now feel as if I've had a massive bucket of iced water thrown over me and am at full grow alert. 

Finishing back where I started this update I've gained a lot of knowledge from the situation that is adaptable to 99% of pest control and has introduced me to the wonders of DE which I'm researching and testing in various guises right now making that several great positives to come out of one massively negative situation.

Hopefully my poor Gorilla will have recovered further by my next update and I'll be able to report good things (fingers crossed) thanks for reading. 

Edited August 21, 2019 by 2Fat2EatThat

[Kipper420]

Hey hey good luck with the DE. Let us know how it goes.

Might have been a bit late for it, that far into flower but I'm pretty certain harka mectin would have done the job as a preventative.

A layer of kids play sand on top of the soil and sticky traps I believe for thirps.

 

[Leafneck]

Glad to see you won't the battle, and hopefully the war. 

 

You've done the right thing looking at the positives and now you have a good deal of knowledge about pests for the future! I hope that gorilla produces the best smoke you've ever had after all your efforts 

[Dinafem-Mark]

@2Fat2EatThat Keep up the good fight mate

 

By the look of things your doing all you can and fingers crossed this is the end to the little critters 

 

Keep us updated mate 

 

All the best 

 

Mark..

[Geoff]

Hi 

 

I've had both thrip and spider mites infestation at times. Separately ... not sure if they get on well enough for a double whammy attack?

I minimised the attack  using the same method you use ... with a kiddies paint brush  painting neem oil onto stems and nodes.

 

Now I keep a spray with 1tsp Neem to 500ml water.

I spray the main stem up to the first buds and mist over the top of the compost.

This is preventative medicine ... I try to remember to do it 2 times a week.

Seems to have worked this season. I noticed a few thrip marks on my outside plants earlier in the year.

But the spray seemed to prevent an infestation.

 

I've also ...

.... put a pot in a bin liner to keep the soil in, turned the plant upside down and blasted it in the shower.

Then left a fan on it for hours. Buds were fine.  

 

Plus spraying with Hydrogen Peroxide which seems to zap bugs without hurting the plant or buds.

I also took all the shelves out of the fridge and stood a plant in the bottom ... (no wife).

 

 

The spraying the compost/soil surface with Neem oil should stop fungus gnats too. Which are more of a winter problem for me.

 

Good luck with the Gorilla .. I have one at 24 days flowering. 

 

[Guest]

On 21/08/2019 at 7:19 PM, Kipper420 said:

A layer of kids play sand on top of the soil and sticky traps I believe for thirps.

 

 

That's the fungus gnat treatment really....although I'm sure it helps for thrips. I've found horticultural silver sand to be the best. Neem oil and pyrethrum all the way for thrips and spider mites.

 

I've successfully dealt with all three at various stages in the past. That feeling when you find a dead one in your bud though.....Makes me want to burn my house down and start life again.

 

After my last few experiences I'm now of the opinion that you should ALWAYS have sticky traps in your grow. That sticky trap could be the thing that stops your next infestation. All it takes is one really, silly to not let the sticky trap have a chance at getting it.

[trichomehi]

Well I've just read this diary, I'm sorry i didn't find it earlier, but never mind I'm here now, great diary well written and very informative, ta for the read....

[Dinafem-Mark]

On 17/09/2019 at 2:01 PM, trichomehi said:

Well I've just read this diary, I'm sorry i didn't find it earlier, but never mind I'm here now, great diary well written and very informative, ta for the read....

 

Welcome aboard my friend 

 

All the best 

 

Mark..