Help with Earthboxes and Fungus Gnats Please
My first Earthbox run was a great success. I ran 3 earthboxes with a 12 week strain, and made it to finish with no issues. No bugs, no deficiencies. I posted pics on this thread a few times.
I now started a bigger run, and mixed 10 new boxes. Plants are about 12-18" tall and still in veg. I notice some Fungus Gnats around and sure enough the sticky traps only took one overnight to collect many specimens.
My earthboxes have DIY organic living soil. No mulch layer.
Earlier this week, I did a spray of N Force Foliar (
https://nforcebiotech.com ; cinnamon oil, tea tree oil). Then 24 hours later per their instructions I did a rinse with water. I am to repeat tomorrow (twice per week total). The gnats came flying when I applied it... but if I just rinse off a day later, I don't see how it will stop them propagating in the soil? Its like you treat then rinse twice a week so how is that to help? By the way my soil mix has some neem meal in it.
Purchased today ; more sticky traps, diatomaceous earth, and "pot poppers" which are Nematodes. (NemaGlobe Pot Poppers).
My understanding is the problem with using DE in a SIP is that then you can't top dress... or rather when you top dress you have to remove all the DE first. Do I have that right? Since these earthboxes were just mixed, maybe a good course of action would be to cover with DE for a couple weeks until flip to flower and first top dress?
How should I use the nematodes in light of the DE? Can they work together? Show me the way please