Grey Bear
Confidential Cultivator
Pest & Disease PREVENTION!
Prevention, Prevention, Prevention!
If you are involved in any significant animal or plant husbandry for any length of time, sooner or later it will happen, a catastrophic pest or disease will threaten your operation.
And that means when we control the environment, such as in closed systems, WE are at the root of the problem many, if not most of the times.
The biggest culprit is hygiene. Period
I have seen this in Aquaculture with ornamental fish, in aviary’s with exotic birds, and in indoor gardens with plants of all kinds.
If we observe good, not necessarily fastidious, but good hygiene protocols we reduce the chances of infections significantly.
Wash your hands if you have been outside of your indoor garden before entering it or handling your plants. It may seem like overkill, but this applies especially to tobacco users. Tobacco Mosaic Virus is catastrophic, one because there is no cure, affected plants have to be removed immediately, two it can continue to plague a grow area even after fairly vigorous cleaning.
I have a quite a large outdoor vegetable garden-I NEVER enter my indoor growing environment without having washed my hands. Since I have been growing indoors, my outdoor vegetable garden has been afflicted with various pests & diseases that were out of my control, but my indoor garden has never had any pest or disease issues.
I attribute this to good hygiene and a bit of luck.
Quarantine EVERY new plant or clone before introducing it to your indoor garden for at least a week, If you don’t, I guarantee sooner or later you will not only have to deal with nuisance pests, you will also suffer a catastrophic loss of your crop.
In aquaculture, I saw this happen most to the small breeders who felt they couldn’t afford the space or equipment for quarantine. They were the least able to afford or deal with the consequences when they were catastrophic.
No Visitors to your indoor garden or at least they should be limited to essential people only. The further removed they are from you, the further removed they should be in relation to handling your plants. (I really don’t let people handle my plants until I have harvested them.) If you let them in to your growing environment, they should wash their hands before or upon entry.
Outfits that deal with animals of any kind usually have some variation of this policy in place, as people and animals that are close to each other usually have developed similar resistance to many of the “local pathogens & pests”. I tend to think the same is true about plants. Visitors that are not close in proximity may have exposure to strains of diseases or pests that your plants have low or no resistance to.
No used or “outside” equipment or tools in your indoor garden. Honestly, I would not use any tools or equipment that have been used anywhere other than my own indoor garden. There are a number of infections that just cannot be easily disinfected.
Don’t leave dead stuff in your indoor garden. We have all done it, plucked dead or dying leaves and left them to sit in a pile in the corner, growing day by day until we do SOMETHING with it. Or we just let the dead leaves fall where they may not bothering to pick them off the floor or even off the top of the growing medium.
Bugs love dead leaves, some bugs like to eat them, some love to hide in them, and some love to make a nest of them, and worse some like to breed in them. They all could infect your indoor garden.
Again, I am not advocating for crazy sterile conditions or anything close to it.
But if you observe these few measures consistently, you will keep your infection rates to a minimum. And should you experience one, will more likely be able to zero in on the source of the infection.
I help medical users learn to grow and establish their own gardens.
These guidelines are something I give each one of them.
I reinforce them constantly through their first and second grows as they should have a pretty good handle on things by then if we have done things correctly.
So far, not one of them have had an infection in their indoor gardens.
Good luck! And Happy growing!
Prevention, Prevention, Prevention!
If you are involved in any significant animal or plant husbandry for any length of time, sooner or later it will happen, a catastrophic pest or disease will threaten your operation.
And that means when we control the environment, such as in closed systems, WE are at the root of the problem many, if not most of the times.
The biggest culprit is hygiene. Period
I have seen this in Aquaculture with ornamental fish, in aviary’s with exotic birds, and in indoor gardens with plants of all kinds.
If we observe good, not necessarily fastidious, but good hygiene protocols we reduce the chances of infections significantly.
Wash your hands if you have been outside of your indoor garden before entering it or handling your plants. It may seem like overkill, but this applies especially to tobacco users. Tobacco Mosaic Virus is catastrophic, one because there is no cure, affected plants have to be removed immediately, two it can continue to plague a grow area even after fairly vigorous cleaning.
I have a quite a large outdoor vegetable garden-I NEVER enter my indoor growing environment without having washed my hands. Since I have been growing indoors, my outdoor vegetable garden has been afflicted with various pests & diseases that were out of my control, but my indoor garden has never had any pest or disease issues.
I attribute this to good hygiene and a bit of luck.
Quarantine EVERY new plant or clone before introducing it to your indoor garden for at least a week, If you don’t, I guarantee sooner or later you will not only have to deal with nuisance pests, you will also suffer a catastrophic loss of your crop.
In aquaculture, I saw this happen most to the small breeders who felt they couldn’t afford the space or equipment for quarantine. They were the least able to afford or deal with the consequences when they were catastrophic.
No Visitors to your indoor garden or at least they should be limited to essential people only. The further removed they are from you, the further removed they should be in relation to handling your plants. (I really don’t let people handle my plants until I have harvested them.) If you let them in to your growing environment, they should wash their hands before or upon entry.
Outfits that deal with animals of any kind usually have some variation of this policy in place, as people and animals that are close to each other usually have developed similar resistance to many of the “local pathogens & pests”. I tend to think the same is true about plants. Visitors that are not close in proximity may have exposure to strains of diseases or pests that your plants have low or no resistance to.
No used or “outside” equipment or tools in your indoor garden. Honestly, I would not use any tools or equipment that have been used anywhere other than my own indoor garden. There are a number of infections that just cannot be easily disinfected.
Don’t leave dead stuff in your indoor garden. We have all done it, plucked dead or dying leaves and left them to sit in a pile in the corner, growing day by day until we do SOMETHING with it. Or we just let the dead leaves fall where they may not bothering to pick them off the floor or even off the top of the growing medium.
Bugs love dead leaves, some bugs like to eat them, some love to hide in them, and some love to make a nest of them, and worse some like to breed in them. They all could infect your indoor garden.
Again, I am not advocating for crazy sterile conditions or anything close to it.
But if you observe these few measures consistently, you will keep your infection rates to a minimum. And should you experience one, will more likely be able to zero in on the source of the infection.
I help medical users learn to grow and establish their own gardens.
These guidelines are something I give each one of them.
I reinforce them constantly through their first and second grows as they should have a pretty good handle on things by then if we have done things correctly.
So far, not one of them have had an infection in their indoor gardens.
Good luck! And Happy growing!
