Caterpillars On Marijuana Plants

Hi! I noticed some bud-Rot developing at a lightning-fast pace on my plants the last week of August, and remembered my friend telling me that he had bud-caterpillars on his crop, and used Thuricide on them. I did some research, and saw that SPINOSAD is also an organic bacteria-based product but with two or more weeks of staying-power—(rather than Thuricide’s 1 to 2 days). My infestation was bad, so I thought that I should apply them both, tegether in the same sprayer. I made the mistake of pouring 1 quart of Spinosad, (pre-mixed from a spray bottle because I could not find any concentrate), then pouring in 1 tablespoon of Thuricide and three quarts of water filling my 1 gallon sprayer. The directions for diluting the Thuricide called for one gallon of water, but I was unable to add a 4th quart because, again, my sprayer held only 1 gallon. My brain was pretty-fried after pulling an all-nighter picking caterpillars off my plants, and I just figured that I could substitute that initial quart of premixed Spinosad for water—(as it WAS liquid after all). Spinosad can be applied-heavily, but the Thuricide was supposed to be just lightly-misted. Well, these caterpillars were ravenously-munching deep inside the bud-clusters , so I thought that if I didn’t completely-saturate-the colas, that there would be nothing of the plants left. Well, it was either the wrong Thuricide-ratio, the applying of both pesticides simultaneously, or the heavy-saturation---(in conjunction with the trauma of the bud-clusters being spread wide-open and picked-through so that I could remove the caterpillars), that I think did-them-in. Within two hours of spraying, my absolutely-gorgeous, plump, wonderfully-fragrant and crystallized-colas were all-shriveled-up to 1/2 their size, and all the hairs that had appeared stark-white and standing-at-attention 2 hours before were now all orangey-brown and withered. All that was left to the once-mighty-colas was a nasty burnt-smell! It was as if someone had dropped napalm on my plants overnight!!!!! Prior to my spraying, I had researched for one whole day whether it was OK to spray both of the insecticides simultaneously, but I could find no articles on the topic whatsoever—-anywhere! Seemingly as I am the first person writing about this topic, I would be extremely-pleased if my experience was not in vain, and hope that both you commercial and individual-growers alike will benefit from my experience and make it through to see a bountiful harvest without making the same mistake! P.S. From my research, I discovered that Spinosad can safety be applied——-via water throughout the grow——to systemically-prevent caterpillars from EVER setting foot on your crop! However, protection by this systemic-approach does not develop right-away. If I we’re still growing this season, I would start doing it AT ONCE to all of my plants, ALSO, I would experiment on at least ONE PLANT——-by lightly-misting the top and underside of the leaves as well as the colas with THURICIDE to see if a plant can tolerate them both this way. This should give you a very-strong long-term protection from Spinosad, plus the immediate “shock-and-awe” of the supposedly more effective Thuricide! Less Content

I already answered this somewhere but, here goes. No. Do not rinse off the organic and dissipating neem oil. It might be OK to give the plant a tepid shower at harvest time as long as you have 4-6 fans to dry it off afterward. :) Less Content