I washed my plants with soap, and now young leaves are curling!

Oh man, I washed the leaves last night to get rid of the mites, and now all of their young foliage are wrinkling. It looks like they might dry out.

I think they'll be ok, but what was the problem? Too much soap in the water? Water too hot? Wrong type of soap (I used non-sudsing dishwashing liquid).

I sprayed them with clean water last night, hopefully that will help. Is there anything else I should do or avoid doing in the future?

Did you wash the soap off? You should be using potassium based hand soap. Soft hand soaps use potassium hydroxide and a vegetable oil, while hard soaps use sodium hydroxide and an animal fat.

Don't use a "detergent". It should really be real soap.

Well, I learned several things today. I've used the correct soap a few times in the past, but ran out and used something else instead. It's powder dishwashing liquid.

I'm, guessing I should rinse the rest of them as soon as I can? Is there anything else I can do?

redlazer said:

Is there anything else I can do?

Click to expand...

ask questions first before you do something again

redlazer said:

Well, I learned several things today. I've used the correct soap a few times in the past, but ran out and used something else instead. It's powder dishwashing liquid.

I'm, guessing I should rinse the rest of them as soon as I can? Is there anything else I can do?

Click to expand...

Yeah, the potassium soap should melt their soft bodies in a very short amount of time, then you can rinse off the soap so it doesn't hurt the plant, although the plant probably wouldn't mind some extra foliar potassium..