Aphids are killing me

[lemagardening1]

Hello there, i am new to gardening. This forum is nice, i just came across it while googling for my problem. I hope some of you can help me, i would truly appreciate your advice. I am a mere beginner so i really need some experts to point me in the right direction.

After moving to a new home, we decided to surround our backyard with roses. what else but the sight of the roses flowering making dirt so enjoyable and the air fragrant so we ventured on this task. We picked up alot of roses from our local nursery and planted them, none of them died - knock on wood. The problem that started was aphids. Those little damn green creations straight from hell! they are on every rose we have.

So in the begining we tried lady bugs. We didnt want to use chemicals so we did that. We picked up so many ladybugs its a party! close to 400 ladybugs released at night over 3 days span after wetting the ground so as we were told by the nursery so they hit the ground and feel like a nice environment to populate. After 5 days these things were flying left and right, it was glorious! but unfortunately after 2 weeks, all the ladybugs were gone and the aphids population didnt get reduced much with all those angels flying over them.

at this point we moved to the next youtube suggestion, soap + pinch of cayenne pepper. tried it ever other day for 2 weeks, did not work!

Neem oil ? done that too for few weeks...

So we guessed there was no alternative but chemicals. We bought sevin insect killer and sprayed every 3 days the roses up/down/left/right/all angles and over the span of 2 weeks, still not dead!

keep in mind before applying any of the above methods, we would cold water spray the roses in case the aphids jaws were stuck on the plant and we wanted to knock them out clean before applying the method recommended. They kept saying when aphids are knocked off, they just move on to new plant but that wasnt the case, the damn buggers kept claiming up withiin hours to the same spots.

We moved after sevin insect killer to all-in-one rose & flower spray concentrate. DID NOT WORK.

please help, we are really down to our last straws. The children are terrified of the green things once they get close to the roses to smell them or touch them. We dont know what else to do.

 

[Chuck]

This doesn't make any sense at all. Aphids are one of the easiest pests to control. Most folks just spray them with soapy water but it does appear that you have a fairly severe infestation of them. The best and safest insecticide on the market is Spinosad Soap. I have not had much luck with Neem controlling aphids because of the reproductive cycle of the insects. Liquid Sevin is an old permethrin based insecticide which can cause adverse reactions in humans. It is toxic to birds, amphibians and fish. Spinosad is not a poison. It is made from a soil bacterium that kills a variety of insects and caterpillars and is harmless to people and pets. Spinosad Soap is a fairly new product and IMO works even better than the regular spinosad. In your situation I would spray every other day for a week.

 

[Mike Allen]

I have to agree with Chuck, not that I probably would do otherwise. Ye! it is very strange that you are having so much trouble. For many years, I have found simply squiging and bugs out using finger and thumb. I like many gardeners hate turning to chemical warfare on bugs. Sadly along comes the time, when chemicals seem to be the last resort. I am not an entomologist, but I do understand the life cycles of the natural world. These pests to us, are the, baby milk and weaning food for baby birds. Hence our dislike of chemicals, for fear of destroying nests of baby birds.
I have been fortunate this season. Over the past few years. Our sparrow populations all but vanished. I don't know, but I link this with the massive local program of homes having gas central heating installed, and the exhaust fumes affecting chirpy sparrows. Now the sparrows have returned. I had the help of a pair of house sparrows in my garden. They dined very nicely, thank you, off my roses. Tits also love aphids. I did a google check. What is the life cycle ot an aphid. Well worth a read. Sincerely hope our friend wins at the end of the day.

 

[lemagardening1]

I will give a try @Chuck and hope it works. I keep reading people saying this is the easiest thing to deal with, trust me, it is a nightmare for me and i have been trying really hard suggestion from everyone. I will buy some Spinosad Soap and run these buggers down every other day.

 

[DirtMechanic]

I have to agree with Chuck, not that I probably would do otherwise. Ye! it is very strange that you are having so much trouble. For many years, I have found simply squiging and bugs out using finger and thumb. I like many gardeners hate turning to chemical warfare on bugs. Sadly along comes the time, when chemicals seem to be the last resort. I am not an entomologist, but I do understand the life cycles of the natural world. These pests to us, are the, baby milk and weaning food for baby birds. Hence our dislike of chemicals, for fear of destroying nests of baby birds.
I have been fortunate this season. Over the past few years. Our sparrow populations all but vanished. I don't know, but I link this with the massive local program of homes having gas central heating installed, and the exhaust fumes affecting chirpy sparrows. Now the sparrows have returned. I had the help of a pair of house sparrows in my garden. They dined very nicely, thank you, off my roses. Tits also love aphids. I did a google check. What is the life cycle ot an aphid. Well worth a read. Sincerely hope our friend wins at the end of the day.

You grow wise in the ways of the @Chuck .