Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

Anyone have a recommendation on how to get rid of whiteflies in a greenhoused system? Tried some VERY carefully applied Neem and lost a couple of fish. Thought about getting some beneficial parasitic wasps, but it is still too hot here in Texas.

bti... (bacillus thuringiensis israelensis)
you can usually find it sold as "mosquito dunks"
fish safe

If you have swarms of them flying around, sticky yellow sheets hung near where they are will reduce their numbers significantly, I'm not sure that bti will have an effect once they are up to the flying stage.

+1 for sticky traps. They are very effective


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

BT isn't effective on whiteflies. Instead, try something like Mycotrol O.

No on the BT. The only way I finally got rid of my whiteflies was a combination of Azadirachtin and the parasitic wasps. The Azadirachtin is a stringer Neem and for me at least, broke the life cycle. Since then, the wasps have been able to keep them in check. I still see white fly, but most are parasitized by wasps. and they haven't gotten to an epidemic like they were.

stOnger Neem. Sorry, looong day.lol

Thanks for the suggestions. Have done the sticky traps; they got some of them but didn't seem to affect the general numbers of them. I've been using a sticky lint roller on the larger leaved plants, and that gets a ton of them! Very satisfying. LOL.

Is Azadirachtin an oil like Neem? I found that some aquaponics folks said it was ok for the fish, but others said it was harmful. Since we had some die-off after application, I hesitate to try another oil....

I read somewhere that the parasitic wasps couldn't tolerate temps over 84 degrees F, so I'm waiting till it gets a bit cooler here. We were thinking of pulling all the plants and starting over.

Vacuuming in the early morning when whiteflies are cold and slow-moving with a small hand-held battery operated vacuum is useful particularly for the adults before a great deal of egg-laying is done.
After vacuuming enclose the section of the machine containing the bag with plastic and put in the freezer for 24 hours.

Companion plants e.g. nasturtium may help to repel the pest.

that's right.. sorry, i was thinking of fungus gnats... the bti worked great for them..

What works really well is a sheet of plastic about 500mm x 300mm dipped in Canola oil. (Let it drip dry) Then attach plastic sheet to a stick at each end and put them in the ground. Place sheets about 1m apart. The whitefly fly into them and get stuck.