Mealybugs Infestation | How to Control and Prevent Mealybugs

[Music] hey everyone it's Whitney with wandering littles and welcome back to my channel today we are going to talk about mealybugs because I have an infestation of mealy bugs I might sit here next to my Christmas tree because well tomorrow's Christmas Eve and I was feeling festive so in today's video I'm gonna talk about mealy bugs I'm gonna talk about what they are how to ID them I'm gonna talk about how to prevent them and then we're going to talk about how to get rid of them I'm also gonna tell you guys what not to do because guess who did these things that we're gonna talk about yep that was me I'm gonna tell you what not to do because I want you to learn from my mistakes alright so let's go to get started so let's talk about what exactly are mealy bugs they are going to be probably the most common house plant pests that you will ever encounter they love warmth they love humidity they do really well in those types of environments so why wouldn't they want to attack your houseplants it's warm you're watering of they're happy they're gonna be really happy inside your plant so they tend to look like little tiny pieces of cotton I won't say tiny but pretty small pieces of cotton on your plant you will sometimes see their little legs but pretty much it just it's if cottony and their appearance you're typically going to find these mealy bugs on the underside of leaves it's more specifically in the veins of the leaves and you'll also find them in the bifurcation so your area is like the V of your stems of plants they do like living in those areas and I'll tell you why in a minute so the other place that you're gonna find them are in newly unfurling leaves they love soft leaves they love the new growth that's what they really truly want to go after so always be careful and look for your in your new growth for these mealy bugs cuz actually actually what alerted me to my infestation of this Arrowhead plant okay so they all say the more you know right so a little bit more about mealy bugs how they feed so the action are considered suckers so they actually have a stylist light projection in their mouth they stick it into the plant usually in the the branches the stems or the veins of the leaf and they actually suck the nutrients out of the leaf it's always good to know your enemy right so when you're dealing with these pests it's very important to know how they feed because that will also indicate how you kill them or treat them so what do you look for if you have an infestation so like I said before they tend to congregate in the bifurcation of your stems so usually right around here on the underside of leaves and in your new growth which I actually have mealybugs off this one that I'm holding right now so this is where they will you will tend to find them so if you have an infestation you will start to see yellowing leaves you also begin to see leaves that are slowly changing colors you'll see a discoloration that's starting from a tip going towards the bottom so on this particular leaf it's just begun and there are actually some milli bugs underneath the underside of this leaf so again you start to see discoloration such as this one right here so now that we know our enemy let's talk about ways to prevent this infestation to begin with so to begin the first thing that you should do and I didn't do it with this particular plant is inspect your plants if you have them outside and you're bringing them in for the winter I did not inspect this plant big mistake the mistake number one right there number two be sure to remove any leaf debris that may have collected in the bottom of the plant so as you'll see here I have oh look it's a maple leaf I'll clean that up later but I have all this organic debris at the base of my plant and guys to be honest you don't want this on any type of plant indoors or outdoors having this type of debris at the base of your plant or tree outside will actually begin to create a very happy environment for any pests any pests to congregate and live also fungus so keep that in mind across the board with your plants inside or out Millie bugs are also attracted to high levels of nitrogen in the soil so do not over fertilize also do not over water your plants like I said earlier they're attracted to warm moist environments and if you continue to overwater you've got breakdown of leaves at the base of your plant these are going to create ideal conditions for any pests to live and breathe so now that we've talked about what mealy bugs are how to ID them how they feed what to do to prevent them we want to talk about ways to get rid of them if you already have an infestation so there are summer ways home remedies natural ways even insecticidal ways to get rid of the infestation the first one a lot of people do and I do it on my smaller plants but I probably won't do it on this size plant because there's a lot going on here is using rubbing alcohol and q-tips and you literally just go where you see the Milly bug and you wipe them off you wipe them clean you want to wipe the entire area though because there might be some eggs or a residue left over so make sure you wipe it clean so that's the first way you can get rid of these guys the second way is creating a homemade insecticidal soap so really you could use Dawn dish soap and mix it with water I'm going to post a recipe in the description box below so you can check that out if you want to make your own thirdly you can use neem oil I'll probably use neem oil on this bad guy and I'm going to completely drench it the underside of the leaves as well inside the plant because like I said they are attracted you tend to find them I should say congregating in the bifurcations of the stems so I'm probably gonna use neem oil on this guy so the other thing you can use and this is not an organic approach so just want to put that off there I realize that but it is very effective is a systemic insecticide now systemic in the work the sense of body is whole body right well in a sense of insecticide it kind of needs the same thing what's gonna happen is you're going to put the insecticide the systemic one at the base of the plant and it's going to absorb this insecticide through its roots and put it out through the entire plant so whole system whole body whole plant I guess it works so it's going to prevent any further infestation that you already have so if you're going to use this I would recommend also doing some sort of treatments topical treatment if you already have an infestation because this is just going to kill your future infestations or I should say prevent any infestations I do need to warn you guys about this while this is a very effective treatment and I do use it in my houseplants inside I don't use them on anything that I bring outside reason being is this will kill beneficial insects that's to include honey bees butterflies anything that's going to use pollen from any plants or any of that that type of thing it is going to get rid of the beneficial insects ladybugs anything so I would not recommend using this on anything outdoors for obvious reasons now if you use it in on anything indoors and you're not moving it outside I truly think it's okay to use pets make sure your pets don't get ahold us because obviously it's an insecticide okay guys the other thing that I wanted to mention is just don't do what I did I did not check this particular plant I usually check all my houseplants I did not check this particular plant for an infestation I also did not clean the debris at the base of the plants and I did not apply my insecticide that I typically use on my houseplants only indoors so really I was pretty lazy on this one and it's biting me in the butt so don't do what I did alright guys that is it for my video if for some reason I do not see you before Christmas I hope you all have a Merry Christmas or whatever holiday you do celebrate I also hope you guys have a wonderful start to 2020 if I don't see you before then but hopefully you will alright guys thanks for watching have a great day

Channel: Wandering Whittles

Views: 2,298

Rating: 4.9036145 out of 5

Keywords: mealybugs, how to get rid of mealybugs, how to get rid of insects in houseplants, houseplant pests, houseplant insects, houseplant tour, houseplant collection, aphids, fungus on houseplants, mealybugs on houseplants, what are those fuzzy little bugs on my plants, insect control, insect prevention, white insects on my plants, what is the white thing on my plant, mealybugs indoor plants, mealybug treatment, plant haul, white bugs on plants, white fuzz on plants

Id: qNiJpbYJyhU

Length: 7min 41sec (461 seconds)

Published: Mon Dec 23 2019