Spider mites???

Hello everyone! So this grow around and my last I have noticed what I thought was just a deficiency. Cal/ Mag is what I was thinking. The lager fan leaves have what looks like tiny rust spots and yellowing. My northern lights strain is untouched. Others are not so lucky. They still look to have a cal/ mag deficiency if you ask me. But after giving my plants some cal/mag and no difference was noticed except a small (P) lockout. I have been looking for pests. Yesterday I have finally found what looks to be eggs on the underside of my leaves. With the help of a new 20x-40x microscope. The kicker is, I cannot find a bug anywhere on the plant!!! So I went to the media looking and this is what I have found. It looks like a spider mite if you ask me. But why are there no webs and why the hell cant I find any on the plant. Only on the top of the rockwool. Any advice on what this is would be greatly appreciated. I have chopped my plants down that where in my flower room and have placed them in large plastic bags to be disposed of. I will be inspecting the bags after a couple days to see what I can find. I know the fuckers are there! I just can't find them. I still have my plants in veg and will be treating them and both my rooms once I have a figured out exactly what they are. I only grow for personal smoke and sadly I will have to go to the dispensary for a couple months or longer. Hopefully not longer cause the cost of flower here in the AK is still way over priced if you ask me.

Lightly mist the bottom of the plant with a mIster, try and spray right at the branch node on lowest branch and look for a web, in your pics I see mites there. There are a few ways to rid your garden of those pesky bastards.
I had them a few times and tried to rid them with a couple of methods I read on RIU. Those worked for a few weeks and then they came back, So I heard about HOT SHOTS pest strip I know it isn't the best thing to use, But if you only put it by your plants for a few hours a day then put it into a ziplock until the next day and then put it back out and repeat for about a month, the month is just to make sure you got all the eggs. I know you should read Precautions before you use them because it say's on package not to stay in room with them for more than 3 to 5 hours. Let me tell you they worked very well I haven't seen a mite in over a year now, and just for your info, Don't let anyone in your room, if you get a clone put it alone without any contact to your ladies for a few weeks to make sure it has no bugs.
I no there are more Methods out here Spinosad I heard good things about also, but it didn't work in my case. also tried the dawn,peroxide,and alcohol method that kind of worked also but they came back again, and I tried some Organibliss too and that worked too but real expensive but very safe and plant friendly, read more on the net about all.
Good luck hope you get rid of them little buggers......

You chopped everything down rather than try to get rid of the mites first? I used a little neem oil with some Safer's EndAll II and after three thorough sprays 3 days apart never saw a mite or thrip, (huge plant had both from being outside), for the rest of it's life.

I took the plant into the shop and used a 500W work light to make sure that every leaf was well wetted top and bottom. Any missed spots showed up as a much lighter colour on the undersides and even missing a small bit lets a few live so you have to be super diligent to get rid of them. A cheap pump-up sprayer works good rather than a hand sprayer when you have to spray almost 2 liters each time to get a good job done. $10 at most garden centers.

So after inspecting every part of all my plants and room like a crack head for about an hour. They are only in the root zone. After that I got online and haven't stopped researching since. I have come to the conclusion that I have Bulb Mites and that they are pretty much immune to everything except
predatory mites "Hypoaspis aculeifer". Anyone ever deal with these with any success?

There where only two plants in my Flower room. I keep my numbers low as I'm only aloud to grow six at a time in my state. They where not looking happy at all and they where only in flower for about two weeks OldMed User. So it wasn't really a huge loss cause I'm sure they wouldn't have turned out to be what I know they can be. They where a blueberry strain which I know are already sensitive. I still have all of my strains in veg. Last night I came across a forum which had some good info on thcfarmer and a link to a study done on the bulb mites. What I thought was eggs on the plant are actually capitate sessile trichomes. So I read that if you dunk the plants root zone in 50 C water for 10min it will kill 100% of them. So I gave it a shot on one of my little ones last night. 50 C in F is 122 degrees. I tested my tap water and it comes out of the faucet at around 130. I filled a large bowl full of hot water (120 F), a meat thermometer, and timed it for 14 minutes just to be sure the entire root zone came in at the disired temp. I kept the temp up by just adding more water straight from the tap. I could instantly see them flaoting on top of the water. And when dunking it to make sure all bubbles have left the rockwool you could see them really come out of the media. Ha haaa! It was an awesome feeling to see them dying. After the timer went off I pulled the plant from the hot water and flushed it with its normal nutrient water from my Rez. The plant did show signs of stress. It resembled over watering, go figure....Lol. This morning and about 20 minutes ago I checked the media for the little f***ers and am happy to report there are no signs of life. The plant is looking fine and doesn't look stressed at all. I normally flush them once a day when I water them anyways. I did find one bulb mite on the very bottom of the roots when I pulled it from the pot. But it was dead. I will be checking this plant over the next few days Keeping a close eye for life. But I think I have found the answer to get ride of these little demon mites. All the info as far as the people complaining about having these bugs is pretty spot on to what I have been dealing with for awhile. I think I haven't noticed them for longer than I originally thought. I think the only reason my plants haven't been completely stunted like other people is due to the fact that I like to keep my flower room on the cooler side, I flush my plants everyday for 15 min when I water, I use recharge twice a week and about every two weeks I add H2o2 to my rez just to keep anything unwanted at bay. These mites mainly fees on dead roots but have been known to feed on healthy roots also. Here is the link to the study done on these bugs. Thanks to mesquite over at thcfarmer. http://www.ct.gov/caes/lib/caes/documents/publications/bulletins/b402.pdf

AkFrost said:

So after inspecting every part of all my plants and room like a crack head for about an hour. They are only in the root zone. After that I got online and haven't stopped researching since. I have come to the conclusion that I have Bulb Mites and that they are pretty much immune to everything except
predatory mites "Hypoaspis aculeifer". Anyone ever deal with these with any success?

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Get a scope or microscope and check the underside of your leaves every few days. The lower laves will get hit first. Forbid 4F cheap on eBay will probably kill them.

I did check them every day. I even put some Vaseline at the base of the stem to make sure. Still haven't found any bugs on my plants in the last week. I've tried a bunch of things on them now and they are pretty indestructible. Neem, floramite sc, mighty wash, azamax, and even 70% Alcohol @ a 50/50 dilution. All dunked and put into its own little cup for inspection later. I started new clones and will be clearing my rooms out, heat treating it, bombing it and sterilizing everything. Clones are looking good so far nothing on them. Hopefully they stay that way. Dicofol (Kelthane) is Supposed to be the best miticide treatment for them. A drench for 30 min on a bulb prior to planting is effective at getting rid of them. Avid and some others also works according to some university studies I've read. But it must be applied in a drench and isn't shown to eliminate all of them once plants are established in soil. So I don't want to go down that road. So if they show up again i will try the hot water drenches. If that doesn't work I'll leave my rooms sterile for about 3 months and start over when I run out of medicine.

AkFrost said:

I did check them every day. I even put some Vaseline at the base of the stem to make sure. Still haven't found any bugs on my plants in the last week. I've tried a bunch of things on them now and they are pretty indestructible. Neem, floramite sc, mighty wash, azamax, and even 70% Alcohol @ a 50/50 dilution. All dunked and put into its own little cup for inspection later. I started new clones and will be clearing my rooms out, heat treating it, bombing it and sterilizing everything. Clones are looking good so far nothing on them. Hopefully they stay that way. Dicofol (Kelthane) is Supposed to be the best miticide treatment for them. A drench for 30 min on a bulb prior to planting is effective at getting rid of them. Avid and some others also works according to some university studies I've read. But it must be applied in a drench and isn't shown to eliminate all of them once plants are established in soil. So I don't want to go down that road. So if they show up again i will try the hot water drenches. If that doesn't work I'll leave my rooms sterile for about 3 months and start over when I run out of medicine.

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1 asprin disolved in 1 gallon of water for foliar spray. Contains salycilic acid. Kicks in the plants hormone protection. It does not harm the plants if no bugs. There have been studies on it.

@AkFrost its been a few months, did they ever come back? I’ve caught similar ones to these when I saw the smallest white spec on the outside of my pot. Scoped it and seen these. There are many types of bulb mites. Mine look identical to these with the long hairs. Seems like an option for control and preventative is a predatory mite “hypoaspis aculeifer” but this species doesn’t seem available in the US. Hypoaspis miles is also an option but not a good one. Miles will only dig 1” deep when looking for prey while Aculeifer will dig up to 4” making it a much better option for bulb mites due to where they like to hang. I wonder if the depth of digging is even a factor in a potted plant situation? Anyone know where to get Aculeifer in the states?

Also I am considering delivering a sample to the entomology department here. Maybe get a 110% ID.

TheGuyWithTheGrow said:

@AkFrost its been a few months, did they ever come back? I’ve caught similar ones to these when I saw the smallest white spec on the outside of my pot. Scoped it and seen these. There are many types of bulb mites. Mine look identical to these with the long hairs. Seems like an option for control and preventative is a predatory mite “hypoaspis aculeifer” but this species doesn’t seem available in the US. Hypoaspis miles is also an option but not a good one. Miles will only dig 1” deep when looking for prey while Aculeifer will dig up to 4” making it a much better option for bulb mites due to where they like to hang. I wonder if the depth of digging is even a factor in a potted plant situation? Anyone know where to get Aculeifer in the states?

Also I am considering delivering a sample to the entomology department here. Maybe get a 110% ID.

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Does this bulb mite just hang around the roots or also on the leaves? I would really be surprised if it is immune to everything. There is a lot of new bio insecticides with spores, fungus and other things.

Here you go:
http://www.everwoodfarm.com/Pest_Insect_Cross_Listing/Bulb_Mites

Bioworks Botanigard has good stuff that uses the Beauveria bassiana spores to infect the mites. Bioworks are helpful by email too if you have questions.