Virus, Pests and Mildew FAQ

Virus Protocols

We are always diligently watching our plants and we will pull up any plants with obvious signs of virus. If we are on the fence about a plant, we fertilize first and watch closely.  We will never knowingly sell tubers or cuttings of clearly sick plants.  

We ALWAYS sanitize our snips in between plants both when we are cutting flowers and also when we cut down our plants in the fall.  We are the only ones who ever cut our flowers.  We also obsessively sanitize our snips and blades when taking cuttings.  

No cuttings ever share water.  

Every tuber or cutting we sell has been grown on our farm by us.  We do not re-sell imported tubers.  

While we take every precaution and follow strict sanitizing procedures, we do not test for viruses due to the high cost and therefore, we can not guarantee that our plants are virus free.  

Pests

Insect pressure in an organic garden is always an issue and can be even more of a problem in an indoor setting, however we use many tools to combat pests in our gardens.  Insect netting, beneficial bugs, molasses and compost tea to increase the resilience of plants.  The main offenders we see and their specific remedies are: 

Aphids:  Aphidoletes, lacewings and ladybugs

Thrips:  Swirski and Spical mites and Cucumeris work for preventative measures and light pressure, but when the infestation is too great and you live in a rural area, you might find that you need to employ something stronger unfortunately.

Spider Mites: the Swirski and Spical mites work well especially when deployed early as a preventative measure. 

Fungus Gnats: watering plants with water mixed with a tsp of castile soap per liter of water seems to help quite a bit.  So do yellow sticky traps for adult gnats and Stratiolaelaps Scimitus, a predatory soil mite to kill larvae, are also a good option.  

We buy our beneficials from Optimize Organics or from The Bug Lady. 

Mildew

Powdery Mildew is pretty much a given when growing indoors.  We have used a number of products, but the best one (hands down!) is Milstop by BioWorks.  Its a foliar fungicide that is OMRI certified for organic use.  

It is the absolute best solution we have tried as it works like a charm.  We buy ours at TerraLink.