I guess I'm referring to the usual suspects, root aphids, fungus gnats, spider mites, ect..
I can also confirm that ladybugs, alone, do squat to stop an outbreak.
Imo, once you have an outbreak, then you are in disaster recovery type situation lol. It happens. If it is mites, make sure you hit them hard every three days, 3-4 times to break the cycle.
Root aphids I don't really worry about at this point. I'll let you know if that changes, but I have had root aphids when I was doing super soils. I have not with a living organic soil. The way I see it, Rock dust = pest deterrent, crab meal = chitin = builds plants SAR (basically an immune system for pests and disease) makes the plant produce chitinase. Neem meal disrupts reproductive cycle of pests. SST's contain chitinase. I try to hit them from all directions.
For bugs on the foliage, I generally rotate mild to more severe doses of botanicals and karanaja/neem. Thrips I use spinosad. I don't worry too much about fungus gnats. They seem to come and go. I suppose if I was worried about it, I would get some h. miles, nematodes, etc, or maybe some BT bacteria. I've not used predators other then lady bugs, but I have been eyeing a couple I might throw in this fall.
Staying ahead of the game is key imo!
Peace!
P-