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Are these spider mite webs?

  • Thread starter Sashoke
  • Start date
Woke up this morning and noticed the sun was shining on something funny looking on the lower leaves of my N. hamata x spectabilis, took a closer look and found chaotic webs on two leaves.

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Are these spider mites? As far as I know these webs have not been here for long, and the plant itself does not seem to be experiencing any stress, no damaged leaves etc. they're all green and healthy. This is the only plant in my collection with the webs from what I can see.

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Looks like it. Are the webs also incredibly flimsy? Could take a good magnifying glass and inspect the webbing for telltale little mite bodies in the webs.
 
Looks like it. Are the webs also incredibly flimsy? Could take a good magnifying glass and inspect the webbing for telltale little mite bodies in the webs.

Yes the webs were easily broken, I am wondering if they were not cob webs or something.


I destroyed all the webs before reading your comment thinking "I will see if they come back now, then Ill know if I have an active problem" so I cant inspect IN the web, but I will look all along my plant with a loupe.
 
Yes the webs were easily broken, I am wondering if they were not cob webs or something.


I destroyed all the webs before reading your comment thinking "I will see if they come back now, then Ill know if I have an active problem" so I cant inspect IN the web, but I will look all along my plant with a loupe.

they usually sit in the webs.
if you didnt see anything microscopic and moving inside the web, they probably arent mites.
look under the leaves. do you see anything red-brown or black?

mites if so.
 
Yes they look like it, seems they like my Ventricosa x Hamata too.

They are very tiny and white/green. I think I can see some on the web of the 3th pic.
 
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Using a loupe I cannot find anything on the bottoms of the leaves, I've even flicked the tops of the leaves while holding white paper underneath to see if anything fell off. There was some debris but none of it was living, mite or otherwise. I guess I will wait and see if the webs come back.
 
Webs have not come back yet, how long does it usually take for mites to make them?
 
Usually if there are webs in that type of concentration than there will be plenty of small mites visible on the undersides of the leaves and around the growth points. There are a few different type of mites that can infect Nepenthes but the ones that I have had problems with are almost always red or brown. If you shine a light against the backside of the leaves the mites stick out as little tiny shadows.

Increasing the humidity as well as mechanical extermination can greatly hinder their spread.

Chemical eradication is the most effective method of dealing with them.
 
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