Drat - More Buggers!

I was admiring and inspecting my violets especially one that I divided about a month ago because it has a zillion blooms on it and I've been waiting forever to see the blossoms so I could identify it. It is a NoID. The first flower was just about to open and I could see inside to the center. I could tell that the flowers were going to be dark purple.

I was horrified to see little white tiny specks of long slender rice looking things running around inside my flower! Oh no! I knew instantly these little bugs were thrips. Usually they are so small you need a magnifying glass to really see them but when you see them on your flowers this big - they have been there a while. These were obviously inside the flowers before they opened up. Possibly from the stems and soil.

So, I inspected all my violets and found two more plants with the flowers infected with them. Most violet growers say to pluck and discard all the flowers and stems, spray with a neem oil spray 3 times for five days apart and bag the violet and isolate it away from your collection for 30 to 90 days.

But - I panicked as usual and not only did all that (yes, I had to pluck all the buds and flower stems from them - ouch!) but I sprayed my entire collection with GardenSafe fungicide 3 with neem. In fact, I think I will set a routine weekly spray of my collection every Wednesday as a pre-deterrent for pesties from now on. I also have been advised to use a permethrin spray on the ones with visible pests (anything with methrin or rethrin will work) and in the soil and water trays to break the reproductive cycle. I have a flea spray safe to use on my dogs that has pyrethrin in it so I used that. 

It's a good thing I look at and am hands on with my violets every day. This flower had just barely opened up half way but I feel pretty good that I sprayed in time to get them under control and save my collection. It's inspect every day from now on. Darn bugs always trying to spoil my fun and kill my pretty little flowers! DRAT!