Possible Fig Bud Mite Cure

[Gladstone1969]

Soooo… I learned that burying fig trees in soil/wood mulch in my area over winter during dormancy eliminated all fig bud mites. Those trees that were not buried and only exposed to cold in Virginia 7a maintained the mites when the wood survived. This was not an intentional experiment, just observational. So, I repeated this in subsequent years for those potted trees that had bud mites for a few years, and sure enough it seems to work.


I’m not sure of the mechanism, but it works like magic (at least in my environment). I kept one infected tree as a control and it still has the mites (and they haven’t spread to my other trees). Perhaps it’s the humidity, or perhaps there’s some predator or infectious agent in my soil/wood chips but there’s no way for me to test it beyond what I’ve done already. Perhaps you can help test this…  

And the benefit was that I was able to keep the apical buds alive for those buried branches, it was cheap, and I haven’t had to use sulfur on my trees to knock the mites down (just to have them return). 

Let me and others know if this works for you too (or not). I’m sure many folks would like a low cost solution like this. Best of luck!

 

[Figless]

@"Gladstone1969"#72 . This is an amazing observation. It seems since fig plants exposed to winter temperatures are not relieved of their fig bud mite infections. So it's not the Virginia cold winter weather by itself, but the wood chip mulch within the soil together with that Virginia cold weather that seems to work for you? This is an amazing, and unexpected result. May I ask do you use a different wood chip mulch on different years, or is it always the same wood chip mulch? Maybe there's something in the wood chips you employ that has a Toxic effect on your fig bud mites? It seems the apical buds are permanently freed of their infection. It's an amazing observation especially if you're using the same wood chip mulch year after year. If you change it every year then I could not understand what's happening except maybe there's a mite predator that's in your soil, and that Predator mite is what's actually affecting your fig bud mites. It's an interesting observation for me.

 

[ktrain]

That is interesting, I know I had a few trees that showed signs of those evil little critters.
Possibly burying them is causing suffocation?
Could be a predatory critter in the soil too.
Either way I'm glad it is working for you!

 

[Figless]

@"ktrain"#2 @"Gladstone1969"#72 it looks like both Kevin, and myself are thinking you might have a natural predator mite in yout soil, or in that wood chip mulch. Either way it's kind of a miracle, isn't it?

 

[Gladstone1969]

@"Figless"#18 @"ktrain"#2  Yup. Regardless of mechanism it works for me. I’m hoping that it helps others too.

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I have used bagged hardwood mulch, pine bark nuggets, and arborist chips. It doesn’t seem to matter - when I’m piling on I use whatever wood chip mulch has been sitting around the trees so it’s broken down a bit. I also  usually cover with a tarp.