little black flies, look like fruit flies or gnats

bren226

Member
these guys are hanging out in my soil and buzzing around
on the underside of the leaves there are lots of tiny yellow dots/balls could be eggs?
my plant is from a clone a friend gave to me a few weeks ago
she seems to be healthy enough and growing but i dont want to be smoking bugs in the end product
I read about using ciggarette butts in water to kill insects
any suggestions?
hopefully I'll put some pics up soon to help identify the culprit
Thanks
 
I'm also having the same issue if you find a cure let me know. It's not like i can make a tea because the damn things can fly.
 

Cory and trevor

Well-Known Member
every body has these things lately dude, I vote fungus gnats sight unseen. Treat it starting with neem and steadily going stronger til you're pouring that hard-core poison all over the place.
 

bren226

Member
I took a better look and I'm pretty sure they're spider mites
i tried garlic and tobacco not sure how that worked out cause theyre still there, maybe not as many
now i tried the hot pepper solution, i read about this in many forums, hopefully thatll get rid of em
 

boxorain

Member
1. Spider mites look nothing like fruit flies or gnats.
2. Spider mites do not fly or have wings.
3. Probability is high that you have fungus gnats.

Fungus gnat larvae live in the soil and feed on the fine root hairs of your babies, slowing growth and opening pathways for pathogens to enter your plants system. They are called fungus gnats because they drastically increase the chances that a fungus will attack your plants. Adult fungus gnats look like small black/dark brown fruit flies, lay eggs in the soil, and fly around but do not feed on the plant.

Gnatrol (< click it, its a link) works very well at controlling the bugs. Gnatrol is organic, that is a natural bacteria that kills these larvae when they eat it. It will not hurt you at all if used properly.

 

jpill

Well-Known Member
you have both gnats and spider mites. the gnats are flying around , the yellow dots and you'll probably notcie black dots as well are spider mites. spray with organci pesticide before the spider mites do some real fucking damage . spider mites = very very bad. like the worst insect you can get bad
 

jpill

Well-Known Member
and yeah, i've been reading a lot of threads lately about people having fungal gnat issues. I am also fighting those bastards thanks to Root Organics potting soil. Their sol has bugs in it FOR REALS !!
 

bren226

Member
the gnats went away by themselves i guess? and after spraying with the hot pepper a few days ago i havent found any more spider mites ;)
 

highdanzil

Member
somtimes mate, you only can see one fly, fungus gnats like to crawl cos there not very good at flying and wont become active until about 70 - 75f or half an hour after your lights are on, i didnt realise i had a gnat problem until my plants fan leaves started dissapearing the damaging part is under the soil, chewing your roots,i have been treating with gnat off for a week , much to no evail, theres still lots of them crawling but ill guess ill find out next week once their life cycle moves on.
One thing i would recommend would be to leave small plastic cups in your substrate with the rims just above soil level, fill the three quarter full with normal coffee with sugar, (2 sugars per cup), if you put too much sugar in itll make a crust on the top, you don want this.
I put some in and about 2hours ago and have death certs for over 200 gnats, first time id had a smile on me face for a week or two,
scraping off the top two inches of your soil and replacing with sharp sand is also a remedy, feeding from the bottom using a tray, but id wait till it got more severe before doing that.
theres also bug bombs that work to kill the adults.
if your in the states, liquid lady bugs the shizzle, but havent found any uk stockists yet, about £30 delivered from the states to uk.
stay safe yo ;)
and bug free
 

knourgro

Active Member
dude if you have pesky winged bugs you can get this stuff called fly tape at home depot. its a little cardboard tobe and you pull the center out, it hangs about 2 feet and is super sticky and coated in hormones. the bugs land on it but cant get out of the sticky. as for the eggs, use some garden spectracide or azamax
 

Jack Harer

Well-Known Member
I had them one grow to the point that all four corners of the room was littered with over an inch of their corpses every morning. It was BAD!!! I tried every organic thing I could think of (except azomax or mosquito dunks) and could NOT get rid of them. There didn't seem to be any real damage either to the plants or my clones though. They were more a nuisance than anything.
 

bren226

Member
I think the black winged intruder was just a misguided fruit fly who couldnt get away from the dank smell of the plant
my grow cabinet is in the kitchen!!

But I for sure had some spider mites or something very close to it
The hot pepper spray after 3 applications has killed them all
Just bought hot peppers from the produce department, blended them up, and boiled them quickly in water.
Strain, and walla - homemade pesticide

Also good against a real intruder, crowd dispersal, or if someone just pisses you off
just spray it in their eyes!!!

I've accually seen this alot in the news lately ;(
people need to smoke more
 

perkele

Well-Known Member
I guess I have the small black flies . They are not flying much, and are smaller then the fruit flies. I've just boiled 4 chilli peppers in about 300 ml of water and made a strong hot potion. I sprayed the ground around the plant...let's hope they'll go...I guess the soil came from the market with thous things inside...nasty people selling bugs and bug's eggs...and giving us, new growers hard life and arrhythmias.
 

tinyharris

Active Member
A bit of info I read somewhere, I had the same problem with those fungus gnats. Lost one indoor plant with root larvae. I bought one of the sticky spider traps for the flyers around the plant. That worked pretty good! They fly into the square trap and stick to the sides. Unaware I had larvae in the dirt. I read you can put slices of potatoes on the dirt and it will draw them to the top. So I tried a couple of spicy curley fries on them for a couple weeks. That did draw them up to top, but they were still alive. And yes, I heard a tobacco and water mixture might help with killing them. Good Luck!
 

perkele

Well-Known Member
I sprayed the soil 2x with my hot pepper soup and no more flies...hopefully nothing in the ground.
 

Weed Demon

Well-Known Member
The larvae in the potting soil will ruin your plants. I have had them for about 10 weeks now. Got them from Miracle Grow moisture control potting mix. The little larvae eat decaying plant matter in the soil and they love to mate in wet overwatered soil.

i tried some chemical shit that the garden store guy recommended into the soil and put out a cup of white wine to attract and drown the adults. I let the pots get dry before the next watering.... about 7 days after the poison and there was no sign of the gnats. I watered the plants and sure as shit the next day they were fucking everywhere and my plants were begining to droop.

So far I have had to cut down and remove 6 sick plants that had 1 foot in the grave. Of the remaining plants I have put an inch of sand over the tops which I have read cuts them up and they die. I have some gnatrol coming in in a few days. i will let you knwo how it goes.

My main point is that you need to eradicate them completely or they will keep coming back.
 
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