Pest preventive

What do you guys use as pest preventive? Reading all these posts about Aphids and spider mites got me worried I'm catch the bug one day. Where do they even come from ?

Keep things sterile, weekly deep scrubs, keep adequate air flow thru lower canopy don’t introduce outside clones until they have been quarantined and dunked for a week. Keep fellow growers outside your grow they tend to carry anything from their garden to yours. Shower and clean clothes whenever going into garden. Highly recommend using an atomizer when applying IPM and spray the entire room from floor to tables underside of plants and on top till they’re dripping wet. Tons of killer products out there but I’ve whipped an 8 year old mite with trifecta crop control if it gets real bad. You can always go with benificials for the natural ipm preventative. Do research on sulfur burners if your ripping in a large area! Cheers

Green Refuge said:

What do you guys use as pest preventive? Reading all these posts about Aphids and spider mites got me worried I'm catch the bug one day. Where do they even come from ?

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First and foremost, clean room, clean tent, clean floors, no pets, clean feet, no outdoor shoes. You can go as far as tyvek suits in the grow room. Bleach wipe down of everything between every grow

Next, regular defoliation when needed, neem oil right before flower, maybe release 3-6 ladybugs per square foot as preventive.

Good airflow to prevent mold, watch your VPD (should be 0.6-1 in veg and 1-1.5 in flower)

I'd be just as concerned about preventing fungal infections as pests. I spray with neem oil and potassium bicarbonate (with a little dr bronners), every other week through veg-on off weeks I spray with Southern Ag biological fungicide. You might be interested in something that induces systemic resistance in plants too, like Aspirin water or regalia if you have a nice bankroll. Another good thing to spray for both is silica-Neem/silica (plus wetting agent) is a well beloved classic that helps prevent both pests and fungus.

Lost Coast Plant Therapy, takes care of almost all problems w bugs n pathogens etc

This is a bit taboo, but my veg room is covered in sevindust. Haven't seen a gnat or evidence of bugs in a while. I haven't needed to use it in flower.
^ This isn't advice per se, read up on carbaryl and it's half life before considering. But if you do a peroxide dunk***, you could probably do it the day before harvest.... I read it isn't absorbed by the plant.

The shit is effective, but you don't want it in your lungs specifically.

Two hugely important things I don't see talked about enough in relation to pest and disease prevention are overall plant health and growing the right strain for your environment.

Weak, unhealthy plants are not nearly as good at fending off the ever present risk of pests and disease as a healthy plant is. Obviously a optimal environment and proper application of water and nutrients are the biggest things any grower can do to insure plant health, but there are some other things you can do to improve health and vigor.

One of the most overlooked of these things is adding Si to your nutrient regime if you are growing in any kind of hydroponic or soil-less medium. Living soil typically has ample available Si, but it is an absolute game changer for hydro. Promotes stronger, healthier foliage and gives the plants a huge benefit in fending off insects and fungal infections.

Anyways, sorry for rambling on.. in terms of prevention products I've had really good luck with Method One PPS. It is all natural, can be used pretty much as often as you want with no risk to plant health, and doesn't seem to leave unpleasant (and possibly unhealthy) residue behind like some of the spay on products I've tried in the past.

Also I'd like to add, do not foilar spray anything past week 2 or 3 of flower unless you really need to.
It can leave residue on your smoke, and can cause extra moisture in the buds and cause bud rot