Mealybugs on Houseplants + Get rid of them

May you think someone spread powder on your houseplant but if you spot them closely, you will find tiny white bugs on them: Mealybugs on houseplants. Join us in this article to tell you:

• What are mealybugs on your houseplant? (Their appearance, habit and symptom of the infested plant)
• What causes mealybugs on your houseplant?
• Where do mealybugs come from?
• How to get rid of them and prevent them from again infestation?

You should know mealybugs are only one kind of common tiny bug that you may find on your houseplant. hence, if you are not sure about the identity of the culprits or you think you have other annoying guests too, we recommend reading “9 tiny bugs in the houseplants”.

Ok! Let’s get going to give you all the things you must know about mealybugs on your indoor plants.

Mealybugs on Houseplants: Their Appearance

As you know here is not an entomology class, we want you just detect these tiny bugs very easily. To make it easy for you, we point out some typical characteristics of mealybugs and show pictures of mealybugs and you can compare your annoying guest with these pictures.

you will find the mealy bugs with the following appearance:

• Mealybugs have oval soft bodies and are pink to white or grey.
• They are about 1/20 to 1/5 of an inch.
• They produce a waxy filament in their hind end that you may think they have a tail.
• They secret a white or grey cottony wax on your houseplant to cover and protect their eggs.

Mealybugs on Houseplants: The Symptoms of Infested Plant

The markable signs of an infested houseplant to mealybugs include:

• A white, cottony cover on the leaves and stems
• The surface of your indoor plant may seem like a wax-like cover.
• You will find sticky honeydew on your plant that is secreted by mealybugs.
• You see ants while moving around your houseplant because they want to feed on honeydew
• The black sooty mould will grow on top of honeydew and will cause a dusty view of your potted plant.
• After a while your plant will wilt and you see the symptoms of decline, slow growth, leaf drop, yellowing and finally it will die.

The picture of mealybugs on succulents

The image of mealybugs on a jade plant

The picture of mealybugs on a cactus

Notice: some mealybugs attack roots, you cannot see them. you just can see symptoms of wilt and decline on your plant. Be careful about them. they are common tiny bugs in houseplants’ soils. If you want to know about them read “Tiny White Dots in Houseplant Soil: Root Mealybugs.”

Mealybugs on Houseplants: Their Habit

If you want to design a perfect strategy to control mealybugs on your houseplant, you should be familiar with the habit of these annoying guests. In the following, we tell you some important habits of mealybugs on your houseplant:

• They live in colonies it is rare to find one of them alone.
• They can move very slowly.
• They love warm and moist environments such as indoor plants.
• They hate cold and dry environments.
• They love soft-growth plants with high nitrogen levels.
• They like to hide between leaves and stems, branch crotches, in the plant’s crown or on stems near the soil.
• They protect their eggs by secreting cotton, a waxy cover.
• The ants are close friends of mealybugs. Ants feed on the honeydew that is secreted by mealybugs and in return, they protect from mealybugs against predators and carry them to new hosts.

Where Do Mealybugs Come from?

Most people ask me, how can these wingless slow-moving tiny bugs enter my home? how do my houseplants get mealybugs? how do mealybugs spread on my indoor plants?

In this part, I want to answer these questions because this knowledge will help you to prevent mealybug infestations. So, keep reading.

In the following, I made a list of ways that mealy bugs can come in and spread on your houseplants:

• First, they usually come into your home by buying an infested new houseplant.
• As mentioned above, mealybugs are light and tiny, hence they can travel with the wind.
• When you go near the infested plants in a garden centre, plant nursery or infested outdoor plants, mealybugs can stick to your clothes. Ye? Ever wondered if you can be a spreader of pests?
• Although mealybugs move slowly, they can crawl from an infested plant to others when their branches or leaves overlap.

What Causes Mealybugs?

So far, you found out how mealybugs can come into your home and spread on your plant. But preparing some conditions is like as you send an invitation card to them! so avoid the following situation:

• Preparing a warm, moist environment.
• Overwatering and over-fertilizing your plants.

Best Practices to Get Rid of the Mealybugs in the Houseplants

Our final step is how to kill mealybugs. In the following, we tell you several practical mealybug treatments to get rid of them and show you how to prevent again infestation. We design our pest management strategy based on small or large infestations.

Part one: limited infection

If you spot mealybugs early you have more chance to get rid of them easily with minimum damage to your houseplant. the only thing that you must do is to remove these tiny bugs. In the following you can find out several practical ways to do it:

• Remove them by water spraying. It can be an easy good idea especially if you get the help of a hard jet plant sprayer.

 ➡ Caution: Before starting spraying, take away your houseplant from other plants to prevent further infestation. It can be a good idea to put a plastic cover on top of the soil to collect fell bugs.

• Get help with kitchen paper, cotton swabs or cotton pads to remove mealybugs. You can dab them into methylated spirits and then rub them on mealy bugs.
• Add I cup of rubbing alcohol with one quart of water and spray all over your houseplant. I always recommend doing it on a few leaves and if you don’t see any burning symptoms on your plant, perform it all over the plant. Repeat spraying weekly.

Part two: huge infection

If you have failed in the early detection of mealybugs infestation on your houseplant, there are still ways that can help you and your houseplant. In the following, you can some of the functional ways to get rid of them.

• Make or buy a neem oil spray and spray it over all your houseplants. please read “How Often to Use Neem Oil for Plants: Make and Use”.
• Get help from predators such as “Cryptolaemus montrouzieri“ or young (larvae) ladybirds. These larvae are very similar to mealybugs and feed off them.

You can find out more natural remedies to control mealybugs by reading “Get Rid of Mealybugs Naturally in Houseplants.”

Conclusion

In this article, I told you about one of the common tiny white bugs on houseplants: mealybugs. I tried to get you familiar with its appearance and habit and show you how they come into your home. Finally, I showed you how to get rid of them.

Do you have any experience with mealybugs? What is your infested houseplant and did the above treatments work well for you? Do you have your specific remedy? Please share your ideas and experiences with my readers below this page. Please feel free to ask your questions from me.