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Pest Watch – Greenfly on Lettuce

Posted on 17. Jun, 2009 by Tracey in Pests

When growing loose leaf lettuce in seed trays or boxes in a mini greenhouse, it is worth mentioning to water regularly otherwise like me one of your boxes may get infected by greenfly if the conditions are too dry and too warm.

Symptoms:

• Check the tops and underside of the leaves for tiny green, light brown or pink bugs,
• Check the leaves for a sticky substance which is excreted by the greenfly and leaves your lettuce non-usable.
• The lettuce leaves may become badly distorted and turn brown if infected.

Treatment:

• Spray with diluted washing up liquid and water and check progress,
• Squish bugs between your fingers,
• Quarantine the infected seed tray or box from your mini greenhouse especially if you are growing the same crops in that area as those plants can become infected as well. I tend to move the tray out into the open, so natural predators can eat the aphids like ladybirds, etc.

Prevention:

• Water lettuce regularly in dry and warm periods,
• Encourage greenflies or aphids natural predators such as ladybirds, lacewing larvae, hoverfly larvae and parasitic wasps by buying a home for them like:
• Bug Box £16.95 from Suttons Seeds,
• Lacewing Chamber £19.99 from Greenfingers.com.

You may also be interested in:

• Pest and Diseases – Whitefly,
• Attack of the Killer Aphids.
• Other Pests and Diseases.

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