Neem Oil…worse mistake of my growing season

I am raising (or was) around 15 high grade sativa plants indoors. About 3 weeks into the vegetative stage, I notice small flies and small holes on some of the leaves. After a google search, I discovered that the best treatment was Neem oil. With the lights out, I spray the tops and bottoms of the leaves. Next day I noticed some of the leaves have burned and curled? “Oh fuck!” I said to myself.

Following instructions, I washed the leaves with warm soapy water and sprayed with distilled water. Now after about 5 days, a third of the leaves have fallen off and more are curling and dying.
Is it too late, or will they recover? I can keep the plants in the vegetative for as long as I want, (currently, 18 hours a day of light) before shifting to a 12 / 12 lighting scheme.
Any suggestions?

I am unsure if I can post photos or not on this forum.

yes you can post pix on any forum

Somewhat same exp with neem. Plants didnt like neem foliar but what did work was spraying the top of the soil. Not a full throttle soil drench, but just sprayed the top of soil every day, every other day...just very often and eventually the bug problem went away. Now i sterilize any soil i bring in the house. Yeah fk neem oil man.

Yeah, neem only works on low grade plants, never use it on high grade.

I use neem every two weeks in veg, zero issues. What concentration exactly did you mix up? Did you add soap to it? That's where people usually mess up...they mix it way too strong or add too much dishsoap. I skip the soap and just add about 5 ml neem oil and 2 ml silica to 1 liter of water-been using it for 20+ years.

I've used neem applied weekly as preventative maintenance, foliar and root drench, on every grow from showing first true fan leaves all the way through veg, until the plant starts showing flowers coming on. When I first started using it, I did fry a few plants when the leaves did not dry all the way before lights turned on or sunrise for outdoor. I've never applied it at too high concentration, but I suppose that could burn leaves too.

post pics of your plants. If they aren't totally dead, they will bounce back in a week or two.

Thanks for all the feedback. Here are some photos I took this morning.

I use neem loads and have done for a while every time I use it I always do a patch test so just spray a couple of leaves then leave for 24hrs different strains seem to react differently to neem spray

Pyxis2025 said:

Thanks for all the feedback. Here are some photos I took this morning.

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Damn, that's rough. I hope they bounce back.

never had an issue with neem unless too high concentration sprayed with high intensity lights on

You sprayed to high concentration just like noobs that over fert then wonder. Neem is fuckin lit use it every run every week even first 10 days of flower 100% lit. Some dish soap small amount mixed in.

One tip I can offer that has served me VERY well over the years is to keep a "test" plant. Just keep a plant like a bonsai mom in a 4-6" pot, keep it trimmed short-of course you need a spot for it, but it doesn't take up much space if you run a perpetual or have a mommy tent. Anyway, just spray it will all of your foliars before you spray your valuable plants, just in case you messed up the concentration or something. It's great for trying new things too-new foliars, nutrients, supplements, medication, etc.

One thing I didn't see mentioned is spraying it right before lights off. That penetrator like soap will fry your leaves in intense light.

never spray just before lights off
maybe an hour before lights on or dim lights for an hour.or 2

mudballs said:

Somewhat same exp with neem. Plants didnt like neem foliar but what did work was spraying the top of the soil. Not a full throttle soil drench, but just sprayed the top of soil every day, every other day...just very often and eventually the bug problem went away. Now i sterilize any soil i bring in the house. Yeah fk neem oil man.

Click to expand...

Agreed...fuck neem oil.
Use a vegetable oil instead for any suffocation of insect purposes.
FF

The OP stated in their first post that they sprayed with the lights out.

The concentration was too strong. The leaves are really shiny. Cannabis isn't a rose and can't take as much. I don't mix it strong enough to get the kind of shine those plants are showing.

When I do neem I use it straight out of bottle and get as soon as lights go out or at least several hours before lights come on.

FastFreddi said:

Agreed...fuck neem oil.
Use a vegetable oil instead for any suffocation of insect purposes.
FF

Click to expand...

I've switched to sesame oil since I already have it around for cooking. Neem oil is one less thing to buy. But I did have some slight leaf burn with the sesame oil while I was playing around with rations. There are commercial products that use sesame oil. Organocide 3 in 1 is one of them. But I'm not paying $20 for a bottle that makes 16 gallons. I can buy a bottle of pure sesame oil for $7 and make over 100 gallons.

My grape vine hates neem in any concentration.


My weed plants have never had an issue with it.


As many have said you had to fuck up the concentration