You brought your houseplants into the house a few weeks ago and everything is going quite well, except that… one plant seems to be covered with small white dead skins. If you examine it more closely, you will discover that some stems and leaves are covered with tiny, doddering insects: Fleas.
Indeed, the fleas can live without problem in the house plants, we explain you how to proceed to get rid of them.
Contents
Identify the fleas in your houseplants
Fleas
They are the most widespread pests, both in gardens and in small indoor plantations. They deform leaves, inhibit plant growth and, like other pests, are vectors of disease.
Treatment: Start by getting rid of the ants! If you see small columns of ants around your pots, the fleas are not far away!
If, in spite of your precautions, fleas settle, prepare a nettle liquid manure (chopped nettle leaves soaked in water) and spray the solution on the leaves of the affected plants. This is the ecological treatment par excellence.
If fleas are very numerous, you will have to resort to a shock treatment: a “systemic” insecticide which, by penetrating the plant, will poison the fleas, including those hiding on the back of the leaves. But spraying chemical solutions is not without danger!
Whiteflies
They are the enemies of orchids. Shaped like small white flies, they settle on the leaves of orchids and function like fleas: they sting the leaves and suck the sap from the plants.
Treatment: spray with nettle manure or black soap.
Scale insects
They are very small parasitic insects (there are more than 7,000 species), which feed on plant sap. Affected twigs weaken due to lack of sap and become covered with a cottony, mealy or waxy mass.
Treatment: Spray or soap the infected parts with a solution of black soap and 1% methylated spirits.
Red spiders
Although microscopic, they represent a mortal danger for house plants, especially orchids. They weave very fine webs around the leaves, make them dry and then fall. The plants die within a few weeks.
The treatment: red spiders do not like water. Spray your house plants regularly with a water mister, this is enough to keep them away.
Thrips
They are small insects with very elongated bodies, brown or black in color, which sting the leaves of plants, leaving grayish spots of various sizes.
Treatment: Thrips are got rid of by spraying water (like red spiders, they don’t like humidity), or a black soap solution. More incongruous, the remains of preparation used to accompany the spring rolls are also a good repellent.
10 ways to get rid of fleas on houseplants
1 – Black soap
Water aphid-infested plants regularly with a black soap solution consisting of 5 tablespoons of liquid soap diluted in 1 liter of warm water (5% dilution).
This treatment should be carried out early in the morning or at the end of a dry day and never in the sun or rain.
If the fleas continue to cling to the stems and leaves, wipe them with a cloth soaked in water and a little black soap on top of them, not forgetting the back of the leaves (these insects like the back of the leaves, at the risk of causing them to roll up).
2 – Match
Push matches into the plant pot with your head in the ground. The sulphur in the match will make them flee.
3 – Glue
Place the glue strips about 30 inches from the ground to prevent the fleas from climbing.
4 – Dishwashing liquid
Spray some water with a few drops of dishwashing liquid.
5 – Ivy leaf
Spray a solution composed of ivy leaves macerated in water for a few days.
6 – Olive oil
Water mixed with olive oil chases away fleas. This ecological solution also feeds the plants.
7 – Potato starch
Mix 30 g of starch with 1 liter of hot water until completely dissolved, add a teaspoon of washing-up liquid, pour the solution into a spray bottle.
Shake then once a day spray the solution on the plants.
8 – Rhubarb
Spray rhubarb leaves with cooking water.
9 – Nettle
Spray a solution based on nettle.
Recipe
Chop 2.2lb of fresh nettles. Let them macerate for 4 to 5 days in 10 liters of water. Filter then dilute (1 liter of this solution for 10 liters of water).
10 – Tobacco
Spray a tobacco-based solution.
Recipe
Macerate a packet of tobacco for 24 hours. Filter it then add 7 tablespoons of vinegar + 7 tablespoons of soap.
Summary
Which are the anti fleas and the treatment adapted to get rid of fleas on your houseplants. fleas are small insects that settle and attack your plants (leaves, stems and roots) to feed on their sap.
It is therefore absolutely necessary to get rid of them since fleas have no problem living in indoor plants.
