Aloe Mite!

[Allen Repashy]

I would like to hear a few opinions on what to do when this is found on an islolated specimen or two in a collection. I am just getting into Aloe's and people have put the fear of god into me about it....

Anyone have experiences... Torch the plant? Burn the Village? Leave Town?
Seriously though, has anyone had any success in ridding a plant of this stuff..... is it a death sentence for the plant and a possible meltdown for your collection?

Allen

[palmbob]

Originally Posted by Allen Repashy

I would like to hear a few opinions on what to do when this is found on an islolated specimen or two in a collection. I am just getting into Aloe's and people have put the fear of god into me about it....

Anyone have experiences... Torch the plant? Burn the Village? Leave Town?
Seriously though, has anyone had any success in ridding a plant of this stuff..... is it a death sentence for the plant and a possible meltdown for your collection?

Allen

I have gotten Aloes infected with aloe mite from many different sources, and now I am pretty sure it is entrenched in my own collection. I have in most cases been able to apparently rid the plant of the beast, but it has been at the cost of disfiguring some plants or at least going without the flowers for that season. I find just about any insecticide kills them as long as you carve away what is 'cancer'. But it shows up again, here and there. Sometimes I toss the whole plant if it's a bad case and I don't care much about that particular plant.

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

My secrets....my secrets....my secrets...all thrown aside for the good of XericWorld....

I've had great success with Merit. It's a systemic, and here's what I do:
(I've only done this with plants in pots, but you could do the same, in theory and with success for in-ground plants.

Place infected plant in water-holding tub or bucket.
Let the plant get REAL thirsty by withholding water til soil is dry. For a 15 gal plant I mix Merit with 2 gallons of water. Pour on plant, letting excess pool in tub or bucket. The dry soil will wick this water up til it's fully hydrated. Repeat this process 3 or 4 times.

For landscape plants, shut off irrigation to infected plant, get it thirsty, and put a 2 gallon bucket with small hole in bottom next to plant. Pour in Merit and water. Water/Merit will slowly leach into ground.

I took some Aloe Peglarae that were ate up with mite and actually submerged them, roots and all, in a 7 gallon tub with Merit for 12 hours.

My friend George says you only need to treat once a year, but I like the scorched earth policy, myself.

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

Imidacloprid is the active ingredient. Use as directed.
I should add that the key to getting fast results with succulents such as aloes is letting them get thirsty. This will rush the treatment to the affected areas. The 3 Bainsii I treated had 'orangish' leaves before I would give them a drink. A well watered aloe, with thick, green fleshy leaves will take longer to absorb the Merit. All theory of coarse, but hopefully you've learned not to doubt me by now...

BTW, it does come in granules as well. I prefer the water soluble powder.

[palmbob]

Originally Posted by STEVE IN SOCAL

My secrets....my secrets....my secrets...all thrown aside for the good of XericWorld....

I've had great success with Merit. It's a systemic, and here's what I do:
(I've only done this with plants in pots, but you could do the same, in theory and with success for in-ground plants.

Place infected plant in water-holding tub or bucket.
Let the plant get REAL thirsty by withholding water til soil is dry. For a 15 gal plant I mix Merit with 2 gallons of water. Pour on plant, letting excess pool in tub or bucket. The dry soil will wick this water up til it's fully hydrated. Repeat this process 3 or 4 times.

For landscape plants, shut off irrigation to infected plant, get it thirsty, and put a 2 gallon bucket with small hole in bottom next to plant. Pour in Merit and water. Water/Merit will slowly leach into ground.

I took some Aloe Peglarae that were ate up with mite and actually submerged them, roots and all, in a 7 gallon tub with Merit for 12 hours.

My friend George says you only need to treat once a year, but I like the scorched earth policy, myself.

thanks... I have mostly landscape Aloe (only one potted aloe with mites). What is Merit? Can Joe Blo off the street buy it or do you need a nursery license (I have found a lot of the 'good stuff' is hard to buy).

[Allen Repashy]

You can buy the non industrial strenght stuff as Bayer Tree and Shrub control.

Imidacloprid is a synthetic derivative of Nicotine, so not as toxic as some pesticides, but it has thought to be linked to the bee crisis by them taking it back to the hive and spreading it around.

Maybe it's not the Active ingredient that kills them.... but the lack of it once they get hooked on the stuff and it wears off LOL.

[palmbob]

Originally Posted by Allen Repashy

You can buy the non industrial strenght stuff as Bayer Tree and Shrub control.

Imidacloprid is a synthetic derivative of Nicotine, so not as toxic as some pesticides.

Maybe it's not the Active ingredient that kills them.... but the lack of it once they get hooked on the stuff and it wears off LOL.

Imdacloprid is an insecticide, not a miticide, and will not kill Aloe mite. In fact, I was reading this actually made Aloe mite infections go wild, so careful

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

No forced fun on my part...I'll get some pics of plants that are now mite-free that I treated this way.

[Tim Harvey]

Aloe mite is often self-limiting, in that the galls can pop themselves free of the plant and die, or outgrow the food supply connecting them to the vasculature.

I use alternating applications of Bayer's 3-in-1 Insect Disease and Mite Control, Carba-dust also known as Sevin (the South Africans swear by this, but I have found it can burn growing centres of plants). I will be adding a new one to the cycle for this year, Forbid (also from Bayer). Cutting off the growths prior to spraying also helps the treatment penetrate.

T

[palmbob]

Originally Posted by Zigur

Aloe mite is often self-limiting, in that the galls can pop themselves free of the plant and die, or outgrow the food supply connecting them to the vasculature.

I use alternating applications of Bayer's 3-in-1 Insect Disease and Mite Control, Carba-dust also known as Sevin (the South Africans swear by this, but I have found it can burn growing centres of plants). I will be adding a new one to the cycle for this year, Forbid (also from Bayer). Cutting off the growths prior to spraying also helps the treatment penetrate.

T

I was curious as to what this aloe mite looked like as I could find little photographic or illustrative information on the web. So I took a leaf off one of my infected plants, took it to my work (veterinary hospital), did a 'skin scraping' as I would do on a dog or cat, and discovered to my surprise that there were hundreds of these little mites on the slide. I thought I was going to be 'lucky' to see even one. Now I just need to take a photo of one with the digital camera and I will send it on to you all. They are indeed quite tiny (need at least 10x to see them) and are short, tubular things with all the legs (only 4) and mouth parts at one end, and just a grub-like body the other 80% of the creature.

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

A pic would be cool. I want to see the face of those I kill....

[palmbob]

Here is the bugger at 40x

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

As you have access to a microscope, maybe I could send you samples of some galls that have been subjected systemically to aloe mite, and see if they're still alive...?

[Allen Repashy]

Wow,

Thanks for the great photo. It is always nice to be able to look your enemy in the eye (if they have one lol)

Steve, I have a nice Leica GZ4 Stereomicroscope here at the house that is mounted on a Boom with ring illumination and will do 40X... so bring a chunk on over and have a look for yourself... It would be cool to treat a plant and do a daily check on the critters....

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

[quote=Allen Repashy;220]Wow,

Thanks for the great photo. It is always nice to be able to look your enemy in the eye (if they have one lol)

Steve, I have a nice Leica GZ4 Stereomicroscope here at the house that is mounted on a Boom with ring illumination and will do 40X...


Of course you do........now nothing will ever surprise me again.

[STEVE IN SOCAL]

Geoff...can you share with us how you removed the mite from the plant? Did you just scrape the surface or did you dig into the plant...? I want to take samples over to Allens every month or so to see the effect of the Merit.
Thx...steve

[Allen Repashy]

Steve, if the plant is five gallon size, we can just look at it directly with the boom mount... otherwise, a scrape or cutting would work I am sure. We could also spray the solution directly on the infected area and see what their reaction is under the scope over a few hours or days... Would be pretty cool to see.. I wish I had a camera attachment...

Allen

[palmbob]

Originally Posted by Allen Repashy

Steve, if the plant is five gallon size, we can just look at it directly with the boom mount... otherwise, a scrape or cutting would work I am sure. We could also spray the solution directly on the infected area and see what their reaction is under the scope over a few hours or days... Would be pretty cool to see.. I wish I had a camera attachment...

Allen

The first attempt at finding the mites was easy... just scraped a bit off the 'icky' part of this leaf and got hundreds of mites. Sadly, I had no camera at work that day so didn't get photos of those mites. So the next day i took down another leaf off a different species and this one had a large gall in the middle of the rosette. I tried to do some surface scrapings along the roughened tissues as I did on the leaf in this photo but could find not a single mite. so then I scraped the top of the gall and no mites. So then I cut the gall in half, and there they were.. .though not hundreds, but dozens.. . I think it all depends on how long the leaf has been infected, and perhaps how heavily.

As for a 'camera attachement'... I just put my cheapo Kodak digital camera up to one of the eyepieces and focused on the mites... and it took the photo no problem. No camera attachment needed.

[thistlesifter]

I've read Some new and valuable info here on Aloe mite control therapy, the comments about dehrydation of the plant before treatment validates the therapy we've used for the last year.

beautiful image of a unsavory much-hated insect Geoff.

I first began seeing Aloe mite damage soon after we relocated the collection from mountain greenhouses to outside plantings in North San Diego County in 1984.

In the first couple of years, only one plant had it, and we thought it was monstrous growth. I took photos to the SDCSS and showed them around to a few people after I began to believe it was an undesirable pest. Several people thought they would like to have cuttings -- ugh!

Sometime after that I learned it was Aloe mite and was told about the systemic that would rid the plants of it (Cygon 2e) now outlawed by the State of CA. I used cygon for several years till I learned it was outlawed and we had them under control up till we had to stop using Cygon.

Through the years since we have watched with increasing concern many casual growers of landscape Aloes as massive gall grew on the plants infected with the Aloe mite. Last time the USDA (AG) Nursery inspector was at our nursery I asked him if there was any known cure. He had not heard of Aloe Mite. I couldn't show him any at that time because we are constantly on the watch for them and I've developed a pretty good way of controlling them. We happened to be very clean at that time. (we knew the when the inspector was coming).

However, a fact-of-life reality for those who grow many Aloes in our zones is that..if you want to grow them you will need to be vigilant to keep the Aloe Mite under control. Further, I have seen them cross over into at least over a half-dozen or more different succulent genera, though they cannot seem to readily maintain their favorite lifestyle in the other genera.

I don't try to treat an Aloe whenever it is lush. I wait till rainy season is over and if a plant is growing under irrigation, I withhold water for a month. (I just started that tactic of dehydration since the rainy season last year). Then I cut as much of the Gall as possible and maintain extreme sanitary practice during the process. I have a variety of tools that are used in the process. Each of these tools is cleaned with bleach before it is used on another plant. All particles (and it can't be done with creating little pieces) are placed in a bucket with a heavy chlorox concentrate in water.

As soon as I've cleaned all the area and have all evidence of the mite 'castle' removed, I wash a concentrate of 50/50 Outdoor Chlorox (available at HD) and tap water. I dilute all the open wound where the mite occurred.

So far I've had good success (about 75%) using the Chlorox wash method. The ones that had to be treated again after a month or so, may have received irrigation water in the interim. It is difficult to rule it out sometimes. I have treated perhaps 30 or so of the several thousand Aloes in our gardens with this treatment in the last year.

I am constantly on the lookout for the mite and one of my greatest obstacles is the inclination to deny their presence till it is too obvious and has progressed. Early eradication is the best approach.

I currently have 6 landscape Aloes that I know are infected. I don't want to destroy them and I happen to believe while we are having wet weather it is risky to other Aloes to treat them without digging them out. I have on occassion done just that in the even that the whole plant is infected. I also never hesitate to take an infected flower or fruit. I keep heavy chlroinated water in buckets in several places to drop these kinds of plant material.

I have suspicions that the mite or its eggs can live in damp soil for an extended period. I also have come to theorize that ants have developed a symbiotic relationship. Ants feed protein and nectar to their queens, while the workers subsist on nectar/sugar. If they want to make new queen they feed protein to their larvae. The mite is a bite of protein to them.

I don't use systemics much anymore though I have BAyers, I seldom use it and never for the mite. The most potent chemicals in my arsenal are Malathion and Sevin. I use those almost exclusively for Argentine Ants around Aloes and Agave whenever I am unable to bait them with boric solution. We have good control of Ants. AG Inspector told me ours was the cleanest nursery he had seen. 98% or our insect control is by organic means. That's one of the few things I can legitimately brag about. It takes lots of work and constant motivation and vigilance.

bob

[uberfugu]

I'd like to chime in with my experiences with Aloe Gall Mite at the UC Botanical Garden at Berkeley.

When I started as the Arid Collection horticulturist here, I noticed galling on an Aloe striata in the greenhouse. We are fortunate in having a university entomologist and a plant pathologist available to us; they identified the problem as an Eriophyid infestation.

Our applicator promptly established a spraying protocol using floramite in conjunction with an organophosphate. Two applications and the mite problems disappeared. Unfortunately, it seems that the pesticide application coincided with a dormancy period. In the spring, the infestations became active.

At this point, I had made contact with Brian Kemble, John Trager, Tim Metcalf, Ernesto Sandoval, and, indirectly, Randy Baldwin. Recommendations included the use of cinnamite, avid, pylon. Conversation with Bayer contraindicated the use of imidacloprid as it depletes predator activity. It was also proposed that my problem wouldn't be an issue in our outdoor collections because the mite probably wouldn't overwinter here (USDA zone 9).

So, here are some observations. The miticide applications didn't seem to have any effect. We are only allowed to do 2 applications of a specific miticide per year, spread 7-10 days apart. This is to prevent the development of a miticide-resistant pest. In all cases, mite activity declined after application, only to increase after a few months. Subsequent applications of a different miticide yielded the same results.

The mite seems almost species specific. I will post a list of affected Aloes (and Haworthias) later.

Despite quarantine protocols (isolation, the use of purell disinfectant), the mite has spread throughout the greenhouse collection and, it has spread to our outdoor collections. Sadly, it must be said that the mite has successfully overwintered here (temps as low as the mid 20s F).

We have currently changed our approach to this pest. We are no longer using pesticides and are only removing tissue when affected. We are also developing a plan to lower the pH of our irrigation water in an effort to increase the health of our collections (our municipal water supply has been tested at pH 8 - 9.3!).

As an aside, we found some South African literature that referenced this problem (I will cite later). It seems that some farmers have had success treating with a Metasystox (Dimethoate - Cygon) drench and injection! One of my unnamed volunteers took an infected Aloe pillansii home, removed affected tissue and injected the plant with Cygon. This sad looking plant is (after two years) still alive and, visually infestation free. Unfortunately, this chemical is no longer available.

Hope this helps

Bryan Gim
UC Botanical Garden
Berkeley, California

[xerophyte_nyc]

A promising new miticide called Shuttle O is due to hit the market soon.

[Tim Harvey]

Forbid is also new.

I had good control of mite last year using alternating applications of Avid and the Bayer 3-in-1 containing miticide.

T

Originally Posted by xerophyte_nyc

A promising new miticide called Shuttle O is due to hit the market soon.

[Allen Repashy]

Steve came over today with some ugly pieces of Aloe and we threw it under my Stereoscope for a peek. I threw a point and shoot over one of the eyepieces, but it didn't work as well as it did for palmbob.

Some interesting observations: The first place I looked for the mite was on the ugly callous tissue that is the typical scarring. I didn't find anything there.... but on the clean tissue around the margins of the callous, we found wiggling little monsters... doesn't look like what I would describe as a mite... more like a tiny grub of sorts... but I don't know sh!t about bugs.

It seems from casual observation, that the callous scarred tissue isn't where the mite hang out, it might just be that once the plant scars up with callous, that this isn't as appetizing to the mite as fresh green tissue... there were no mites at all to the right of the image.

Geoff, did you take note of where it was active?

I don't know if they burrow into the plant, but it seems they were active on the surface... I would just think that cutting off the callous might not be the way to rid the plant of them if since it seems they were more active on the clean and adjacent tissue.

The crappy photo shows the edge of the callous tissue on the right, and the mites clearly out in the greener pasture.. (though this real distance is probably only an eight of an inch.



Any thoughts?

[thistlesifter]

it is prudent practice to destroy good tissue adjacent to the gaul.

Also any open wounds created during the surgery may host a new infection of any lingering mites, therefore requiring a remedy.

one recommended treatment is to seal the area of by applying insecticide to the wound after surgery.

I' have usede 50% dilluted Outdoor chlorox in direct application into the wound. The tissue is thus killed. leaving no viable tissue for the mite. I'm not sure it the chlorox kills the mite immediately, but we have had repeated success with this. Not 100% successful.

We withhold irrigation from treated plants for at least 6 weeks. This seems to improve the effectivity of the process. Sometimes on weaker plants the chlorox treatment is lightened.

Bob

[palmbob]

I found the mite locations to be unpredictable.. deep in a the center of a gall I found none, usually, but in one plant, that was the only place I found mites. they do seem to normally be nearer the surface, but buried still (not gotten any mites right off the open surface). Mites do wiggle a lot, but should not be able to be seen by you naked eye..if you did see something like that, were not mites..