Frugal Aphid Murder and Transplant Lessons

It's hard to resist the allure of vegetable and herb transplants. There they are: sweet, alluring, and tangible. Seeds give only the promise of a plant in the coming weeks while a transplant is simply there, beguiling and waiting. Don't let them enchant you, this botanical horror story will take the charm away from a transplant purchase.

 Pictured front and center, the bell pepper in question

I usually start my vegetables and herbs from seed, but I couldn't resist some transplants this year. First I bought very healthy looking bell pepper transplants from the Riverside Arts Market. A couple days after I bought them home they were already infested with aphids. None of my other potted plants were infested; peculiar. I haven't seen aphids all year. Curious and curiouser.

I decided to try some organic aphid remedies I remembered:

- I made an orange peel tea/infusion. I saturated the plant with it, and waited until the next day. There were fewer aphids, but they still survived.

- The next day I strained a stronger infusion and again saturated the plants, but the aphids live on.

- I found a lady bug and placed her on a bell pepper plant. She went to work quickly eating one large aphid but didn't do more damage than that.

This weekend I bought some nice-looking eggplant transplants from the same vendor. When I was ready to transplant them I looked very carefully and noticed minuscule white aphids! They were barely detectable, but they were there.

My lesson is learned, you have to look very closely at transplants you purchase. I hope the new plants stay strong for me while I research more methods to kill the pests. I thought I was cutting corners, but now I have to spend time and energy finding ways to murder the aphids.

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