Mealybugs

Yea, I think I have had a large scale infection throughout the garden area for a long time, it is just i have some plants that for some reason they don't seem to like to they do ok.

I think I need to look into some chemicals to try and cut the numbers down.

Ugh, i don't even dislike bugs, but the ones that kill my plants are really starting to be a pain in the rear!

The alcohol/water spray works really well for me for mealy bugs and aphids but I've never battled this big and infestation. Here is my recipe: 1 cup water, 1/4 cup alcohol, a few drops dishwashing soap. Insecticidal soap would be great but I didn't have it handy the first time I mixed this & since my recipe worked out ok I didn't switch to insecticidal soap.

I hope you get those suckers!

And it works for soil/root mealybugs? I need a drench for the soil.

Even if I went and pulled up plants and tossing them I could not add new ones back in until I got the soil cleaned off them. Too bad it is not potted plants ... I could drench roots in buckets of water to float the bugs out (repeatedly for a good day or so) and then repot with fresh soil and pot. But they are in the ground.

From what I have been reading soil mealybugs are much harder to treat than the leaf kind.

Soil mealys are much more difficult, and sprays like that above will not work. This is one of those cases where there is no substitute for a systematic pesticide drench.

So there are soil mealeys and root mealeys? I dint know that. I've only dealt with regular mealeys on leaves and branches and that's what I use the alcohol spray for. Sorry for the mixup.