.
GREENFLY AND WHITEFLY
Fuchsia growers are very lucky in
that they are not troubled with a lot of pests and diseases you
can quite easily control, but it is better not to let the
conditions get hold, prevention is always a better cure.
Pest’s greenfly
can usually can be seen in clusters around the light green tip
of each shoot. There appearance can cause damage to the plants
in that they are sap-sucking insects, and this action causes
distortion and curling of the leaves. There fast breeding habits
means you need take action as soon as you see them spray them
regularly over a period to make sure that you kill them and they
do not come back.
Whitefly can be
very troublesome and unfortunately fuchsias seem to be a
favourite of this pest. These little white flies are seen under
the upper leaves of plants, but the sprays are only effective
against the adult flies. The eggs are not affected, so you must
keep spraying at intervals of about four days to kill the
emerging adults before they can lay more eggs. If a four day
spraying cycle a severe attack can be cleared in a couple of
weeks. The earlier you find them the easier it will be to stamp
out. So check your plants regularly if you have one or two use
your finger and thumb this works very well.
These mites are
I suppose, one of the worst types of pest for fuchsias. They are
very hard to detect in the early stages and are, infact almost
invisible to the naked eye through out there life span. Plants
which have attacked by the red spider mite(not a spider at all
really) can be recognised , as the foliage turns to bronze
colour and becomes very brittle, in later stages very fine webs
can be seen spreading from leaf to leaf. This pest is very
contagious and rapidly spreads to many plants in a greenhouse.
It is often considered that an attack of red spider mite results
from poor growing conditions. The mite thrives in a hot, dry
atmosphere so if your plants are growing in the correct type of
conditions for fuchsias (warm and moist),you are unlikely to
suffer severely from it. Plants that are affected should be
moved away from all your other plants and can be sprayed with a
good systemic insecticide. I would burn the plant.
Vine Weevil
larva is one pest which seem to have become a lot more common in
recent years, it seems to got worse since we have used peat
based compost. The adult is black, beetle like insect and is
nocturnal in its habits. The first sign to look for if you see
notches are seen to be eaten out of the leaves, at first you
might think it could be a caterpillars. The greatest damage
done, not by the adult beetle but by the larvae. The eggs are
laid on the surface of the compost and when they hatch they
produce a grub which is about half inch in length, whitish with
a brown head. These grubs burrow down into the compost and feed
of the young roots, doing untold damage to the young plant.
Again one of the best cures is treat with Pravado vine killer 2.
VINE WEEVILS.
The vine weevil larva is one pest, which seems to have
become far more common in the last few years it seems since
we have been using peat based compost. The adult is black
beetle like insect and is nocturnal in its habit. The first
sign you see of the adult vine weevil is notches out of the
leaves, you might think caterpillars are doing this; the
most damage is not done by the adult beetle but by the
larvae. The eggs are laid on the surface of the compost and
when hatched they produce a grub which is about half inch
[1cm] in length whitish with a brownish head.
The grubs burrow down into the compost and feed of the young
roots doing the damage to young plants. One of the first
cures suggested was to soak the plant in malathion seemed
quite effective and potting back older plants in fresh
compost in early spring and is a good time to discover
whether you have them present.
The adults being nocturnal need hiding places by day in
rubbish under staging of greenhouses is an ideal place for
them to hide. I think the best on the market at the moment
is pravado either dips the plants or give them a soaking
done regularly give all year protection and does whitefly
and greenfly at the same time.
RUST
Fuchsia rust is a disease, which has
become hard to get control of if you don’t see it in the early
stages and can affect all plants because wind and moving a plant
make it airborne so transmit it to all plants in the area.
It is easily
identified by reddish brown marking (rings) on the upper side of
leaves, while on the underside typical brown pustules can be
seen it looks just like rust. The spores on the underside on the
underside of the leaves can be passed from plant to another
purely by the movement of the air, and also on the hands of the
grower or by insects.
The cure for
attack or rust is firstly to remove all the affected plants away
from any others, some growers say take the affected leaves off
and burn them but I find doing this can make it airborne again
so it infect more plants, my cure is to burn the plants that are
affected or put them into plastic bags and seal the tops.
If you treat
them I have used rose clear 3 which work well if you treat them
early enough but keep them away from other plants, and keep
checking them until you see no sign of the disease about two
weeks.
Most plants
bearing rust spores are sometimes first brought from a nursery
or any where you obtain your plants so always check and keep
them separated from all your other plants until you happy about
two weeks unless you know who you got the plants from it is
always better to be safe.
Botrytis is one
of the main diseases of which you need to be aware. It is easily
identified by a grey hairy like mould, this can be caused damp,
airless conditions, rotting leaves and lack of air circulating.
If you grow to many plants packed together promotes the
conditions for the growth of this disease. The cure is get
plenty of air circulating open the vents all year when possible,
and the prevention of cold, damp, stagnant conditions. If plants
are affected by botrytis they should be sprayed with a good
systemic fungicide or if the weather is cold this would only add
to the damp conditions, you could dust them with a fungicide
powder.
S.E.E.F.F.
