Hey there!!! I had that too earlier in the season, all over the waterlily pads and the lotus leaves. Ladybug larvae took care of the ones on the lotus, you would have though the stems were black it was so bad...but the ones on the lily pads, I would just gently push the pad under the surface, and brush them into the water and the fish would eat the ones that I didnt squish all over my hands, lol.

I had these too, and I looked it up online and they said to spray the leaves adn blooms with water, which I did. I am sure it's only a temporary solution.

They also said to cut off any dying leaves, because these seem to attract the bugs.

I am having the same problem. I went in and cut all the dead leaves off, every day I have been spraying the leaves with the hose. You have to do it with quite a forceful spray and every day.

The best solution I learned (on the old AWGS forum) is to spray the leaves with Pam cooking spray. The vegetable oil suffocates the aphids and is totally harmless tofish and other pond critters. Rinse the dead aphids away with a garden hose after ~15 minutes.

Your skimmer will take care of the slight oil slick in a few minutes, but if you don't have a skimmer, the oil dissipates in a little while anyway.

Every season is different: This year I haven't had an aphid infestation, but floating scum algae is driving me nuts. It's usually gone by May or early June.

Good Luck,

nmpondguy

Hello, everyone. I'm a newbie, both to this forum and to gardening. With a little help from E B Stone, I was able to grow a beautiful container of nasturtiums. Before I could wipe the smirk from my mouth, however, I noticed that there were millions (exaggeration?) of little black bugs (I have looked at them under a magnifier and they have little legs, some move, but most seem to be piled up). They're disgusting and I bought some spray that I was told would get rid of them but it didn't seem to work, so tonight in a fit of exasperation, I ended up shearing off the whole lot-- in other words, the nasturtium is essentially no more. Where did I go wrong? I have been inspecting my little beauties every day and never noticed anything amiss. Suddenly, these parasites are everywhere!!

Bugs happen when you garden. Aphids are easy to kill with dish soap and strong jets of water when they are on land plants. No need for poison or shearing...

No one put dish soap in their pond please!

I also have had these this year on my water lilies. I've been trying to use the strong blast of water to wash them away. I like the other suggestions, but I don't know if they are really doing anything all that detrimental to the lilies or if it's just that I don't like the look of them on my precious plants..

This is the first year I haven't had them. Usually I do. They never seemed to do any harm that I could tell, just looked awful.

I noticed that ants were spreading the aphids around my plants. I had enough salvinia and waterlily pads that they could cross to almost all my plants. I culled out a lot of the salvinia and hosed off the plants and this worked to get rid of most of the aphids.

Spraying aphids on waterlilies with vegetable oil cooking spray does kill them without harming the pond. Do it in the early morning and try to wipe off as much as possible after an hour or so with paper towels.

Don't spray water lettuce or salvinia it will kill it.

I have had my water garden for 16 years, and this is the 1st year i have a total infestation of the stupid little black 'aphids'? They are on my hyacinths, lilies, flag plants, and even on the airators that float on surface. They were even on my Lotus Vine, but arent on any of my other potted plants, so i find this weird.

I don't want to do anything that will hurt my frogs, tadpoles, or goldfish. My pond is too wide and long for me to reach the middle of it, where alot of the plants are. I have no idea where to even begin. Did this happen because we have had so much rain ober the past 8 weeks? I am in upper S.C. region...please help.