Aphids, how do you get rid of them?

[ruthiechan]

I have this enclosed patio that has one strip of earth. These tall flowering weeds are growing there. I want to take those out and then start a mini garden, though most of it will be grown in containers. However, these weeds are COVERED in aphids.

How do I get rid of them in an environmentally safe way?

[havejoy]

Once you take out all the weeds and till the soil the aphids should go away because they won't have anything to eat. I keep them off my plants by spraying warm water on them and knocking them off. I've heard the water should have soap in it to work really well but I haven't had to add soap yet.

Environmentally safe? Well, if you had a bunch of Ladybugs, they would thank you!

But, its probably too late for that. If they are really going to town, you probably should visit your local store and mix up a chemical spray. When I had my house, I used it when things got out of hand with Aphids. But be aware when you use the chemical spray, you kill all the bugs. So I use it only when they are REALLY out of hand.

[ruthiechan]

I really don't wanna de-weed with them on the plants still. Maybe that's silly of me, but I've always been rather dubious of aphids.

Yeah, lady bugs would be nice, lol, but I've only seen one lady bug around here and it wasn't in my yard!

The odd thing is, the aphids are only on these weeds, no where else. So I'm concerned that if I just yank them they'll move and "go away" to harrass my neighbors roses and my little purple flowers in the yard.

So, with that concern and my likely silly dubiousness on touching them (yes, there are that many) I'd rather axe them before pulling out the weeds.

[havejoy]

A lot of aphids are monophagous, which means they feed only on 1 species of plant so you probably don't need to worry about pulling up the plants they're on. They'll just drop and die.

[ruthiechan]

Okay, so uh, dumb question then, will they hurt me when I pull the weeds?

[havejoy]

They shouldn't unless you have some weird allergy to aphids.

[Iggy]

Aphids are vegetarian- that is why they are eating your plants. They can't hurt you at all.

Once you have yanked out all of the weeds- best to get that done before the weeds go to seed by the way. Hose the area down with soapy water. Get one of those dispensers that attach to the garden hose and holds insecticides/herbacides etc. Only put Ivory Dishwashing detergent in it. About 1/4 c detergent and then fill with water, attache to your hose and spray the entire area with it.

Do this several times over the next month- this will kill the aphids, but it won't hurt anything else. You will want to kill the apids before your plant more "food" for them.

Go to Organic Gardening online Organic Gardening - Home Page and study up.

[Jbs2763]

you can buy ladybugs online.... we used to buy them from the seed catalog

[lisajo]

A spray bottle of water with a little dish soap.....it works very well.