hey dear plant friends, i´m in desperate help. a lot of my plants have fungus gnats and i´ve treated them several times with nematodes, cinnamon, sand and now also those ugly yellow catchers. none of it seems to work. i tried trying the soil out, still see them everywhere. all the pots have drainage and i water them once a week/ once in two weeks. they´re all standing in the sunny side of my small apartment, where the sun sets. some of them are babies i grew myself but most of them are not.
do i need to change the soil again? need to try a different pest control? please help me out cuz i have no idea what to do now and getting so annoyed by those flying bastards. 🙁
by Wonderteef1312
17 Comments
Nematodes didn’t work?😵💫 I’m at a loss, tbh. Assuming you used the right ones and watered with them, I have no idea how they could fail…People will suggest insecticide at this point, because nothing else seems to work. Which one to suggest depends on your countrys regulations.
Have you used in the past that’s organic calledEco-evenger ready to use insect spray ,Amazon has this usually, good luck!
There is all so bug tape use both!
You have to completely break their lifecycle if you want them to go away.
I’ve only had it happen once, but here’s what I did to get rid of them. First start keeping the plant a bit on the drier side. Water it from the top once time, and then bottom water it the next time. Keep the yellow things nearby to catch the adults.. Also try replacing the top layer of soil. Also mosquito bits can be helpful, but I’ve never used it.
You just have to keep up on it and eventually you can get them gone. Although it might just be easier to repot the plant. Just be sure to wash off all the old soil and clean the pot or you might just be back in the same situations.
In the future, try adding more perlite to your potting mix. If the soil drys out a bit between waterings, it makes it MUCH harder for them to get a foothold.
I have over 90 plants and have been battling them for 9 months. I have many yellow sticky cards. 5 Zevo plug in flying insect traps. Sprayed soils with fungus gnat killer. Watered with peroxide water. And had a pesticide guy come in and spray last week.
Still have them🤢😞😩. Good luck
Mosquito dunks got rid of them when I had them. Break a little piece and leave it in water overnight. Use that water to water your plants but let them dry out a little before watering. Mosquitoe dunks are reusable and will last a long time. It make take a few months to completely get rid of gnats, so stick to this method until they are gone.
Soda water kills em dead
Water them with a ratio of 2:1 water and hydrogen peroxide. It works.
I lightly mist 91% alcohol on top of the soil everyday and maybe even twice a day (not a super heavy spray, just using a super fine misting bottle.) It evaporates quickly and doesn’t seem to hurt my plants, but kills those little gnats on contact. Their eggs might be just under the top layer of your potting soil so they might continue to hatch for a few days but all usually disappear completely within 3 to 7 days.
Now if you have a real delicate, sensitive, fragile, expensive plant… I might just spray in a wee tiny area to see how your temperamental angel reacts, but I’m not really coating the leaves a lot (altho they don’t seem to mind and like I said, it evaporates really fast.) I’m just lightly misting the top layer of the soil for the most part and letting it evaporate off. It kills any of the little knats that just hatched and are buzzing around on top of the soil on contact. Good luck. 🌱
Diatomaceous earth was the only thing that worked for my infestation. Was a last resort but it did the trick when nothing else mentioned did.
I have some of these plants too, and those can dry out for a while without really suffering. Gnats can’t live in dry soil, they need it to be damp to live.
Keep the sticky traps for the adults and stop watering your plants. They also generally live in the top half of your pot, not on the bottom. So, if the top half of the soil drys out the larvae will die, and the sticky traps will take care of the adults.
I also have pothos, tradescantia, and snake plants. These guys will be fine to dry out. Once or twice a week is probably too much water for them anyway, especially with the snake plant. The other plants I don’t have, but as long as it’s not a picky plant that needs to be slightly damp all the time, then they should be ok drying out a bit too. Good luck!
Mosquito bits, worked for my plants a year ago. Now I am dealing with spider mites using neem oil spray. It’s always something or the other to keep our beloved plants healthy!
Had these in one plant and used the search bar to find someone who suggested covering the soil with coffee filters, so nothing can escape and nothing can enter the soil. You can continue to water through the coffee filters but wait as long as you can before doing so. Keep the sticky traps on top of the coffee filters to catch any new fungus gnats. I did this with one plant that I had and it seems to be working. I posted with a picture of what I did on someone else’s post. Here is the link. https://www.reddit.com/r/plantclinic/s/jACowSyMFE
I have that same groot planter I can’t tell what you have in it but the drainage on mine was terrible, so if you’re looking for an overly moist soil suspect check him!
Put lime on it, it will eliminate all the flies…
Mosquito bits. They are now apart of my soil mix and I never have any issues. You can also buy the dunks put one in your watering bin let it soak and use it to water and they are gone
I got a couple sundews (sticky carnivorous plants) when I had a real bad infestation and it resolved the issue completely in a few weeks. Before that nothing had worked (not even nematodes, because I have a LOT of plants and it was just impossible to kill every single generation of gnats at once).
Mosquito dunks worked for me, you just let a big piece of the mosquito dunk soak in water for at least 24 hours. I usually shake the bottle or whatever you use to soak it in pretty good if it has a lid so the pieces break up more, and then just water your plants like normal with that water. They should start to go away in a few weeks