I know what your thinking, and him being my buddy I've caved to this already I think. Like now, I'm finding out about spider mites. Knock on wood I dont have the damned things, he does. I mentioned to him once in passing about Neem oil and he goes out and buys it and just sprays the shit out of everything with it and still has them. I could go on and tell him about some other products he might want to try, but see again, who's doing the work here?
I figured if he cares enough about his hobby I'll see HIM but some of the effort into managing it right?
Doesnt mean I wont help him though, and I probably will I'm just sayin.........
Like I said here or somewhere else theres 2 people on the planet I told about what I do and I deeply regret them both. One was him, with me never expecting in a million years that he would half ass follow me into it, and the other is a niece who is like a stray cat that I cant get rid of now. I have to feed her buds all the time or I'm a no good prick. Every time I open my door, she's standing there like Neuman on Seinfeld.
I am originally from Chicago (cold climate) and never had spider mites or even heard of them. I think they are most common in warmer climates. Not saying they don't have them, just they aren't that much of an issue; never heard anyone talk about those bastards! Anyway, fast forward, last year, I helped a dispensary out that I grow for, when he had another grower going to get busted, so that guy took all his equipment and left all the plants (to die or ???) and simply disappeared. The dispensary owner asked me if I could handle any of the 198+ plants that were in their 2nd week of bloom. I told him no problem and he brought over 44 plants that I could fit in between the rows of my plants already well into bloom. I figured they'd at least, survive but weren't directly under my light tracks. They'd get the overlap from the adjacent rows. Well, one morning, I go out to see my loves when low and behold, I got them, and big time. It never dawned on me to check the plants first; figured the guy was a pro and this wasn't in the cards. Because I was dumb and didn't quarantine them or even look at them, the mites got a foothold and migrated to each and every one of my plants! Fuck what a mess. Now I had a fight on my hands. The short of it is that I have become somewhat of an expert in their eradication. I mean, I tried everything I could in the pursuit of their demise. I DID THIS WHILE KEEPING MY GENETICS ALIVE so that the future could happen and I didn't loose everything. I couldn't afford more seeds and liked what I was already growing having established nice strains and their propagation through cuttings. What I found out is that
every chemical concoction I could find all had the same facts associated with them. That is, passed on immunity and resistance to these chemicals. Point in fact is that the mites pass this immunity on to the eggs/young and you basically have to be chasing them with new chemicals each different treatment. They do not desire the buds and I believe the insect repellant concept of the chemicals in the buds is effective.
I found a simple and inexpensive concoction that is taken from old school remedies (found here too) that is basically Habanero Peppers, Garlic, Tobacco and a bit of Olive Oil. For some reason, this doesn't fall into the passed on immunity category, costs little to produce and only takes a few hours to formulate enough to use on a medium sized grow operation (<50 plants) for several weeks of constant spraying. i now even use it as a preventative spray. I also found that an atomizing mist sprayer (+/- $250.00) works wonders in effectively getting every square centimeter f plant surface because as we all know, it's the places you miss that they keep alive in. Another effective technique is to use a cellulose sponge strip wrapped around the stem base, above grade 1" or more,
stops their migration from an other plant; obviously one
cannot let adjacent leaves touch each other, they migrate this way too. No fans (air moves them nicely, that's natures' way). The pepper concoction doesn't harm the plants, in fact, they seem to like it. The Spider Mite plunges his/her little snout into the leaf to extract the essential sugars from photosynthesis. This leaves the spot we see, as well as i diminishes that area from further production. Repeated sticks into the leaf forms those lovely spotted patterns that are the sure fire way to tell if you got them, but too late. They basically suck the life blood from the plant causing a complete slow down to stop in growth and ultimately lead to the plant's death. Mites "migrate" that is they crawl, so anything one can do to thwart this, will help indeed! The pepper spray is the bomb! Be careful when spraying, you can get a real "hot shot" from handling it and the fine mist gets into your eyes as well...