Backyard Aquaponics
A place to discuss aquaponics

I posted a few days ago about my seedlings turning yellow and shriveling up. I noticed some of the seedlings have these weird lines on their leaves. Then today I saw a teeny little bug on one of the plants that had the most lines on its leaves. I wasnt able to take a picture of the bug or capture it. It was extremely small, like mite-sized. I looked up spider mites but it didn't look quite like them. It looked more like a tick than a spider. It was dark colored, maybe a bit reddish, but not bright red. I'll post a pic of the damage done to the leaf. Any advice on what it is and how to get rid of them? I think my plants probably also have an iron deficiency as was suggested on the last thread I started. Seems like I've got more than one issue here!

The system is inside BTW.

Leaf Miner damage. They live inside the leaf and make tunnels. You can sometimes squash them but if they're only affecting certain crops you might be able to remove the affected leaves and cover the plants with a row cover. Make sure you dispose of the leaves don't put them in the compost heap. Plants that attract parasitic wasps might help in the future.

http://www.ipm.ucdavis.edu/PMG/GARDEN/VEGES/PESTS/vegleafminers.html

http://gardenmentors.com/garden-help/insects/ipm/controlling-leaf-miners/

The plants that are being affected are tiny seedlings, so I just had to pull them. But how do I prevent it from happening again? My system is inside and it's a very cold winter here right now so it seems odd to have them in the first place. If I just wait a few weeks before planting those plants again might the leaf miners die off? I can't cover my plants cause they only get light from fluorescent lights and nothing would grow if it was covered even a little bit.


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I get them all the time. They don't seem to hurt the plant much. The fruit is unaffected.

My plants were shriveling up and dying before getting their second set of leaves. So I was thinking the bugs could be the problem. Maybe on bigger plants they don't have much affect but for the sprouts it is too hard for them to grow once they get attacked and don't have very big leaves and get stunted? This is inside so there is not much choice for the bugs, maybe they don't normally go after such small plants but are because there are no big plants? Does any of this make sense? Or am I barking up the wrong tree and should keep thinking I have an iron deficiency too and that is my main problem?


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I'd keep treating for the iron deficiency. I'd use a fine mesh row cover over the plants that they like and start them in a different spot. If they can't get to them the plants do better. I have had these wipe out beets when they were small.