permaculture

[Keith D Johnson <keithdj@mindspring.com>]

I too had aphids all over my winter lettuces. Instead of trying to kill them 
I fed the soil and plants with minerals and seaweed concentrate. Their growth 
picked up and the new leaves were bigger and had fewer aphids. THEN, almost 
magically, the little buggers started to become inert and stopped feeding. In 
short order most of them became, when revealed by close inspection with a 
hand-held 10power magnifier, to have been parasitized by a species of nearly 
invisible tiny wasp. Now the aphids are dry husks with maturing wasp larvae 
that are beginning to emerge from tiny holes in the aphid's shell. A new 
generation of parasitoid wasps is now being unleashed in the greenhouse and 
the problem has faded.

The presence of aphids, and chewing / sucking insects in general, is 
indicative of a mineral imbalance and usually a shortage of calcium, though 
the full range of minerals and trace minerals should be supplied. A 
well-nourished plant is able to send a message to the insect world that it 
needs help. The cavalry, in this case a member of one of the MANY parasitoid 
wasp families, received the call and rode (flew) to the rescue.

I'm going to reward them by growing lots of flowers.

-----Original Message-----
>From: Amy Little <amylittle@hvc.rr.com>
>Sent: Mar 23, 2010 2:00 PM
>To: permaculture <permaculture@lists.ibiblio.org>
>Subject: [permaculture] aphids in greenhouse
>
>Yikes, aphids on my beautiful pepper starts. I can't squish them all. 
>Any advice?
>
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