How's best to deal with thrips at day 30/40 (autoflowers)

[Ras K]

I've just noticed on one of my plants some silvery, slimey substance and when i looked further it became pretty clear that thrips are causing the issue. I've ordered some sticky traps to make sure it's 100% thrips and to help get rid of some, as well as some diatomaceous earth and neem oil, but my question is what would be the best way to treat the tent/plant in question.
They've just started flowering 2 plants are on day 40, 3 of them on day 30, so i'm not sure if it's too late to use neem oil to treat them as i've heard a lot of mixed reviews/opinions. So should i just use the diatomaceous earth and sticky traps along with decent defoliation or spray the plants with neem and hope for the best?

[M_C]

Neem should do the trick... but don't get into a habbit of using it later in flower

[Ras K]

It's my first grow and first time using neem oil, so excuse the novice questions but would you recommend doing a one time treatment or multiple every 3 days for two weeks? Also should i spray every plant or just use the DE and yellow sticky traps for the "unaffected" plants and spray the one with the visible issues? From what i can see the thrips are only on a few leaves of one plant so it's not a full blown infestation yet but i want to knock it on the head properly. My concern is if i use the neem for 2 weeks (assuming i spray the entire plant and the new budsites) will it effect the final flavour/negatively effect the development of the flowers? I'm pretty sure the plants have at least another 40-50days before they're done, so hopefully that'll be enough time to prevent the neem being an issue for the final harvest?

[M_C]

Thripps don't fly - sticky traps are useless for them. If you are seeing small flies then it most likely is fungus gnats

Neem isn't for all... a good quality fruit & veg spray will often work just as well

[GEORGE]

There is A certain type of Salt you can buy that will kill ever bug in your soil. Can't remember what it is, but you should be able to google it.

[Ras K]

Yeah pretty sure you're talking about diatomaceous earth, i've ordered some to put on the top layer of the soil hopefully it'll help.

[Ras K]

Haven't got the traps yet so no i'm not able to confirm definitively, but i'm 99% sure thrips is the issue, also from what ive read i thought some species could fly and they were attracted to yellow sticky traps at soil level but the sources may not be reliable. I'm fine using neem to be honest as i cant imagine it'll stay on the plants longer than a few weeks and there will still be a month left of flower if i do a two week treatment. I guess the only question is should i do a one time treatment or multiple over 2 weeks?

[dick_turpine]

Haven't got the traps yet so no i'm not able to confirm definitively, but i'm 99% sure thrips is the issue, also from what ive read i thought some species could fly and they were attracted to yellow sticky traps at soil level but the sources may not be reliable. I'm fine using neem to be honest as i cant imagine it'll stay on the plants longer than a few weeks and there will still be a month left of flower if i do a two week treatment. I guess the only question is should i do a one time treatment or multiple over 2 weeks?

Hi Ras,

You should only apply neem oil once every 5 to 7 days and only just after lights go out.

[Bethmeg]

You can also dilute the DE Ive read in water and spray that.It’s not something I’ve tried but may do in the future.

I’ve recently bought provanto fruit and veg spray which was recommended so hopefully that will work for me and scattered DE on the surface of the media.I’m growing photos and currently in veg so I can do pretty much anything with mine,not so much if you have buds.


It won’t hurt having the sticky traps as although they can’t fly,as they are so small and light they can be blown about by the fans.

Regular shaking of the plant is something else I do.
I also squeeze the leaves if I see any thrip damage in the hope I’m squashing the little buggers

[dick_turpine]

I have tried diluting DE and spraying it and it works very well. Leaves a lot of residue which is what you want so you need to wash that off when you're ready.