Índice

Products to combat aphids in marijuana plants

The aphid or Aphididae are a suborder of hemiptera insects where the whitefly and cochineal are found, among others, they are small and of little varied appearance, they are known throughout the world as aphids and have nothing to do with Unlike ordinary fleas, aphids are parasites of flowering plants, forming large colonies on the undersides of leaves and stems of cannabis plants.

They are small in size, just a few millimeters, they can be seen with the naked eye but to confirm it we can use a microscope, they are of varied colors, especially green, yellow or smooth black and sometimes with spots, the body is ovoid with three regions, head, thorax and abdomen, within the same species can be wingless (without wings) or winged in this case it has two pairs of erect transparent membranous wings during rest, these insects secrete a sugary substance through the anus on which the ants feed and the bees, these in turn protect the aphids from their predators such as ladybugs and chrysolemmas.

Aphid

Aphid reproduction

There are two very important biological characteristics of different forms of reproduction of aphids: viviparity and heterogony, several generations of parthenogenetic females alternate with an amphigenic generation linked to a polymorphism. They appear when the environmental conditions are no longer adequate. This last characteristic, together with the exclusivity of numerous species on the same plant, means that there are up to twelve different types of biological cycles among aphids.

The cycle of aphids is short and there are two types: monoecious – eumonoecious if they only need one plant and dioecious if they need two plants, although sometimes it can happen that due to the reduction they do so in a single plant and it is called paramonoecious.

Aphid larvae

Aphid pests on marijuana plants

Aphid pests can become a serious problem in indoor marijuana crops as they find the ideal temperature and humidity necessary to be able to reproduce continuously and that will cause serious problems if not treated in time, leading to loss of the harvest. In outdoor cultivation we will find aphids when the temperature is warm.

Aphid symptoms in cannabis cultivation

Aphids feed through a biting-sucking system, which breaks the tissue of leaves and stems and sucks the sap from the plants, due to this the plants can catch other diseases.

These insects are easy to see due to their size and the first damage that we will observe in the plant will be yellowish, dry and wrinkled leaves, the appearance of ants due to the sugary substance that the aphids give off would put us on alert.

Aphid infestation