Planta
Back to Pests, diseases and problems

A while ago I bought a gardenia not realizing it was infested with… | Pests, diseases and problems | Planta community

Lilly

A while ago I bought a gardenia not realizing it was infested with thrips. Not knowing how serious the situation was and having no experience with infestations, I bought some bug spray that gets rid of thrips and expected them to go away within a day or two, and put the gardenia next to my other plants; although I did separate it a few times because I noticed some of the thrips on its flowers and took it down to spray it again. Only last night I had realized how much of a pain these bugs can be and I’m panicking not knowing what to do. I checked my other plants and everything seems fine except for my new satin pothos plant. 😥 I’m seeing 2 white marks that don’t like the normal silver marks it has, and I found a leaf with some odd holes in it. I believe I have reached the maximum amount of photos for this post and will try to add my satin pothos photos in the comments. What are the steps and things I need to do to get rid of these bugs, and should I be worried about my other plants? 1st photo: Photo of what I believe is a thrip 2nd and 3rd photo: Possibly damage from thrips? 4th photo: plant spray I’m currently using

Attachment 1 of 4Attachment 2 of 4Attachment 3 of 4Attachment 4 of 4
5 likes 5 comments

5 comments

  1. Lilly

    This is the satin pothos plant that I’m worried may have thrips. I haven’t seen any of them on the plant yet. I just recently bought this a week ago so this damage may have been from the store.

    Attachment 1 of 2Attachment 2 of 2
    0 likes
  2. Paniinii

    Oh no :( I’m so sorry! Make sure the affected plant(s) is a couple feet away from any others. I would rinse the plant off in your shower or sink to knock off as many thrips as possible and then spray down with the insecticide you have. Spray every day for a week, make sure you’re getting tops and bottoms if all leaves, and then treat weekly after that. After a few weeks and no more signs of bugs you can take them out of quarantine. I treat all my plants once a month or two to be safe.

    1 like
    • Lilly

      Thanks! Do you think my Satin Pothos plant could also have thrips?

      0 likes
    • Paniinii

      Honestly if there’s a chance, just go ahead and treat it. I always lean on the side of caution!

      2 likes
    • iambijoux

      This is exactly what I did! At the time, I had about 110 plants. I would grab one from a certain site in the house and spray it down in the bathtub. I was able to do around 20 per day. I treated everybody (cuz I recycle water and there was no way to know where the eggs were and weren’t) weekly for a month and added systemic to all my soil. After that month, I was thrip-free!

      1 like