If you've read any of my posts you likely know I maintain a fair size artificial rain forest under "glass". About a year ago I ordered some plants out of Puerto Rico and those plants apparently came with scale eggs on them. I've tried oil sprays with varying success but nothing like what I had hoped to achieve since the pests just keep on showing up around the atrium. Finally I began doing some research and learned there are a couple of small beetles that will eat scale! I ordered 50 of them and they appear to be doing the job so today I ordered 250 more! If you are interested in a natural way to control these pests you might want to check out this website: http://www.rinconvitova.com/Scale control.htm The company apparently is the only one in the United States that grows Lindorus lopanthae although others offer them for sale. If you compare prices you'll find Rincon-Vitova offers them at a much better price. Since I also have rain forest animals in my atrium I just don't like to use sprays. And this appears to be a very good natural alternative!
i like the idea of dealing with introduced pests by bringing in their natural predators!! good job, steve!! what rain forest animals do you have???
I have at least 40 rain forest tree frogs (three species) including the Costa Rican Red Eyed Tree Frog. They reproduce annually in the spring so it is now difficult to keep track of the number. We always see baby frogs in May of each year. I also have at least 20 Green Anoles plus all sorts of natural insects. The only insects I try to control is the scale and some ants. In the spring the ants come out of their underground cover and begin to swarm. Right now they are running in long columns everywhere trying to find food, but the frogs and lizards do make good use of them as food! I introduce 1500 baby crickets into the atrium once a month to feed the frogs and lizards but they also serve a very useful purpose by providing a natural rain forest sound in the evenings. One thing I found very interesting about the Lindorus lopanthae beetle is they also have a hunger for pollen. As a result I find them climbing the spadices of some of the Anthurium and Philodendron species I am trying to pollinate naturally. One of the chief natural pollinators of both genera in the wild is beetles since they will also eat pollen. But I don't mind sharing some of it with them since they also track up and down the spadix and spread the pollen along the length. Right now I have a cluster of 6 large spadices of Philodendron sagittifolium up at the 14 or 15 foot level (around 5 meters) in the atrium and I can't get up there to try to pollinate them. I don't go around advertising the fact, but I'm in a wheelchair. So these little beetles are becoming very useful. I can use a long telephoto lense and see a few of them up there trying to eat the pollen. Hopefully they will also produce some seeds for me!
