Whitefly plague

Surely you have seen in person or heard of the white fly If you have crops. It is one of the most common pests in the agricultural world and in gardens. It attacks both ornamental plants and vegetables. Therefore, it becomes a frequent threat to all those who want to keep their crops in good condition. Some of the most affected crops are tomatoes, zucchini, peppers, melons, and watermelons. For a better understanding of how to combat this pest, you can consult more information about the pest in tomato crops and other recommendations in this link about whitefly.

We are going to analyze in depth this annoying pest to show you how you should identify, prevent and get rid of them in the event that the crops are infected. Do you want to know everything about this pest?

How is the whitefly detected?

This insect is known by the scientific name Trialeurodes vaporariorum. It can thrive in both temperate and humid climates. Therefore, the time of year when there are more of these insects is in spring and summer. They are miniscule in size (between 1 and 3 millimeters) and among their family we can distinguish different species.

It is a plague that has appeared in a complicated way. Such is its invasiveness that it becomes very difficult to control. Its life cycle is around 10-30 days. In just this period of time it is capable of reproducing itself repeatedly, reaching 80 to 300 eggs at a time. This makes it a very rapidly proliferating organism. To better identify the symptoms of infestation, you can read more about Symptoms and treatments for fruit flies and how to prevent and treat whitefly infestation.

Ability to attack crops

The whitefly has the ability to attack plants through suction mouthpiece They feed on the sap of leaves until they are dry. Their presence can be detected by observing the underside of the leaf. They settle there precisely because it's the area of ​​the plant with the most pores, giving them better access to the sap. They can also be found on the stem.

The damage it can cause is very serious. By feeding on the sap, it leaves the plants weakened and causes a stop in its development and a loss of fruits. You may notice that affected crops show symptoms such as dry, yellowing leaves. This can also be a sign of other infections. For more specific treatment, we recommend reading about home remedies against whitefly and see how they can help them.

How to prevent whitefly

Whenever diseases and pests are discussed, the best is prevention. Preventing the proliferation of whitefly in any crop allows us not to have to deal with the consequences. If the pest arises in greenhouse crops, it is more dangerous due to its high level of contagion.

Some of the measures that can help control it are:

• Let the natural predators (ladybugs) act to attack the whitefly.
• If we water the crops continuously and adequately, we will prevent it from spreading.
• It is important to stick to the planting schedules that have been established.
• Develop crop rotation throughout the year.
• Eliminate weeds and weeds appearing around crops.
• Control the appearance of ants. Ants protect the whitefly from its natural enemies.

On the other hand, if whiteflies have already appeared in your crops, you should resort to specialized products. There are different pesticides that act on the central nervous system of foods and block their acylcholine receptors. This interrupts the transmission of nerve impulses, and the insect is paralyzed and dies. For greater effectiveness in crops, you can read about a specific remedy against whitefly which may be useful in this situation.

Some home remedies

In ecological gardening there are several remedies that we can do at home, and that will help us regain the health of our pots or our garden, such as:

• Garlic: crush about three cloves of garlic and add them to a liter of water to pulverize all parts of the affected plant.
• Basil: This beautiful plant repels whiteflies like no other. Plant several in your garden and learn more about plants that repel whiteflies.
• Chromatic trap: many insects are attracted to a specific color. In the case of the plague that concerns us, it is yellow. To make a trap, you just have to buy a cardboard or plastic of this color and, to make them stick, we can use honey or oil.

This involves creating our own plant, knowing that many insects have a weakness for the color yellow and are attracted to it. These insects will gravitate toward the color yellow, unable to resist it. So, using this knowledge, all we have to do is take advantage of this knowledge to trap them so they can't escape and harm our crops.

For this, we can use any material that makes them stick together such as glue, honey, etc. We have to bear in mind that if we use the glue that is used for mice we can make a bird get trapped and die. As we do not want this, the above mentioned or oil and soap can be used as glue. In this way, we can place yellow rags impregnated with these materials so that whiteflies are attracted to it and let's manage to weaken the plague making it reach acceptable levels for tomatoes and that they do not produce damage.

I hope that with these tips you can get rid of this annoying pest.