General prevention....

[mtequine]

Ok....I have about 50 plants now, a few in my biology classroom but most at home. Both locations have birds-Lovebird and budgies at school and African Grey and Meyer's parrot at home.

I have a mix of catts, phals, phrags, paphs, dends, oncids....

I notice that my phal. violacea and my some of my catts that came from a...hmm...not so great grower have black areas on leaves. Some look like they are due to injuries (the violacea), and then the catts I just don't know why the have leaves that turn black. Almost all of the plants are producing new root and leave growth and seem reletively happy.

I fight stupid mealy bugs pretty regularly, and I use Safers or other insecticidal soap....

I read recently that many growers regularly treat with physan or other anti-fungal products just as part of their normal care. I know that cinnamon has antifungal properties and I've used that on my phal. violacea-literally just sprinkled cinnamon right on the leaves.....

How nasty are the chemicals like Physan? Do those of you with birds, etc. use it in your homes with the birds? Is cinnamon just as good? Is there a better way to use the cinnamon? Or a "natural" product that is cinnamon based for this purpose?

Do many of you treat regularly even if there isn't a terrible-plant near death problem as a preventative?

I'm in a very arid area-and most of my plants are spaced pretty far apart. I run a humidifyer in the room that has the oncids and phals/phrags and the parrots in it in the winter....

Thoughts?

Thanks!

MtEquine

[KC C]

I have parrots (Goffin's cockatoo, Hahn's macaw, Green-naped Rainbow Lorikeet), a Mali Uromastyx, a small saltwater aquarium,3 cats and 2 large dogs. I remove plant(s) to be treated to room fartherest from animals (if weather is too bad to take plant(s) outside for 30 mins.) and then treat with either Neem Oil or Garden Safe (fungicide). For mealies I go over the plant with tweezers/Q-tip and a shot glass of alcohol first then spray with Neem Oil properly mixed with water and detergent in a spray bottle. Neem Oil is safe for all animals except insects and even has a pleasant light musky scent that doesn't linger. It doesn't outright kill the insects, it makes them not want to feed so they just sit on your plant and starve to death, that is why I remove any many as I can-I don't like looking at them while they are starving. Go over your plant again in 10 days for any that have hatched out or moved over from another source. A week after the second treatment, you can shower your plant if you want.

[Piper]

A fungus will often attack an already stressed plant. I use Physan 20 - make sure it's the 20 and not 27 - on plants that have leaf damage from cell collapse, sunburn, etc. The damage can often leave the plant susceptible to a fungal attack.

At the recommended dilution, Physan 20 is ok indoors with pets. Physan 27 is industrial strength. You can't enter your greenhouse for 48 hrs after you spray with it.

McJulie