Hi everyone, Recently I noticed these little insects on one of my orchids. So far I tried getting rid of them by removing them manually followed by liberal application of soap water. Now they appeared on a second plant so apparently I was not successful.

Any tips?

  • einkorn@feddit.orgOPEnglish
    3·
    12 days ago

    Definitely not springtails. I have not spotted them in the substrate so far, only on leafs. Looking at various scale insects on Wikipedia this one is the closest match I could find. Higher resolution on this scale is a bit difficult.

    • Günther Unlustig 🍄@slrpnk.netEnglish
      4·
      12 days ago

      Whoops, I thought you meant these tiny black spots.
      Yeah, definitely scale bugs. You can get rid of them using insecticides.

      I can recommend you “Spruzid” made by Neudorff. You can find it pretty much everywhere in local garden or hardware stores, like Dehner, Obi, etc.
      I like it because it’s by far not as harmful as other (synthetic) pesticides, especially for pets. It’s even fine to use it on veggies.

      You can speay your phalaenopsis in it until it’s completely soaked. Repeat that after a few weeks.

      Often, pests are just a symptom of an unhealthy plant, so maybe fix the underlying issue first, like nutritional deficiencies or insufficient light.

      I pretty much never have to fight pests with my houseplants, and even if I get a contaminated one, they somehow don’t spread and just disappear.