Kitchen Garden Forum

Could I get sensible ideas for eradication I.e. Commercial sulphur candles / flowers of sulphur / jeyes fluid etc
We have a serious infestation. There are 1000 of the little --- everywhere

Spraying wherever you can with a diluted solution of Jeyes Fluid might help.

The other suggestion which really isn't t a sensible one might be to leave some dying embers of a wood barbeque in a galvanised bucket. Overnight. i read recently that an individual was killed of monoxide poisoning by leaving a dying barbeque in an unventilated tent overnight.

This might kill the spiders but it will probably not do your plants any good either, so probably not a good idea!

Bear in mind that a sulphur candle will kill every living thing, plant or animal, so you would have to clear out all the plants!

Hello Interex. I had a really heavy infestation Of the little blighters in my greenhouse. The first time, I didn't recognise what the problem was until it was too late,trying to work out why the cucumber plants weren't thriving and the leaves going a funny colour. When the penny dropped and I realised what the problem was, the damn things were abseiling all over the cucumber plants, hanging in huge strings from every leaf and tendril. I tried spraying them with one of the bug sprays which claimed to kill them but it was far too late....there were too many to kill.

I thoroughly cleaned the greenhouse with Jeyes and used one of those candle thingies in a tin. Burnt all the canes as well.

The following year, I kept misting the plants as RSM love dry hot conditions and even inspected the plants with a magnifying glass, hoping to catch any infestation early. I still got the damn things...every spray I tried had no effect and it all ended up like the previous year.

There is a predatory mite which can be used as a biological control but I haven't tried them and I'm not sure how well this would work in a Poly tunnel.

I had been buying in tomato and cucumber plants from the garden centre....I started growing from seed again and have not been troubled with RSM since. Could be coincidence of course but I think the little horrors were already on the plants when I bought them.

I wish I could be of more help. The mere mention of RSM fills me with dread.