Neem oil

Can I buy Neem oil at a major retailer or do I need to go to a nursery? So far I haven't had to get the strange looks, or suspicion of going to one yet, but I will for this as I'm only a week into my grow and I think I'm ALREADY getting a bug problem. Any help would be appreciated thanks.

-GT

You can often find it at your local health food store. I live in a rural area and even our little health food store had it in little bottles. It has all sorts of medical uses in Indian medicine. It is an anti-fungal so the clerks might think you have athlete's foot or something, but nothing more than that. I just got some and 2 applications have just about wiped out the dreaded marijuana mites! I think the third time should do it. Be sure to add a little soap (I use Dr. Bronner's hemp oil soap- good stuff and the bottle is quite a trip!) to make the oil mix with the water.

I live in a small town, but we do have a health food store!!!! I just hope they have it. I've read I just need a soap that doesn't have phosphate right?? Any ideas on how much soap I should add?? Thanks again for the reply

-GT

I am in love with neem.

The product that WalMart sells as 'fungicide 3' in an ugly turquoise bottle has neem as the active ingredient.

But the stuff at the health food store is going to be a lot better quality.

I add about 3/4 teaspoon to a pint of water. I use 2 - 4 drops of the Dr. Bronner's soap. I'm using the lavender scented kind, but the peppermint might add to the bug killing properties. The peppermint is VERY STRONG- my kids loved it for baths when they were little. Put the neem with water and soap in one of those spray bottles, shake well and use it in a few hours of making it up. You might want to give your babies a shower first to knock off as many as you can. I seal the soil off with foil (2 strips and a little tape-so I won't be flushing the plants and the knocked-off bugs don't get into the soil) and give them a half hour shower with cool (not cold) water. Switch them around a couple of times during the shower so all the plants get well sprayed. If you have one of those hand-held shower hoses, you can do a great job of getting the underside of the leaves. Skunk Magazine's current issue has great articles this month on pests and also neem. When you spray, do it just before "lights out". This minimizes the chance of burning from water acting like a lens. If you must spray during their "day", raise your lights as far as you can. I have a fan on 24/7 to circulate the air to lessen any chance of mildew. Give the girls another shower early the next "day", using the foil again, but only for about 10 minutes. Then spray your soil with neem,- the bugs can hide there and apparently neem can get into the plant through the roots and poison the bugs systemically. Using a pest strip is a lot easier, but my mind is easier knowing that my pot doesn't have a first cousin to nerve gas in it! (Think about it! Those pest strips are an air-borne poison strong enough to kill a living thing (a bug) and your plants are bathed in this strong cloud of poison! Your lungs are very vulnerable to nerve gas and you will be smoking the pot and breathing the grow room air!) Mother Nature knows best! Neem works several ways, it physically smothers small pests, makes them vomit, totally disrupts their digestion, and really messes with their ability to reproduce. And it is harmless to warm blooded creatures. Ya gotta love it! :dance: Someday when you're bored, run a search on neem- it's a fascinating plant with a thousand uses.

I went to our health food store and to show how useless this town is, they didn't even have neem!!! How cheap... So I went to two other stores...no go was getting angry. Then I went to Lowes and sure enough they had it!!! Go figure, I bout it and some organic insecticide soap. It's supposed to be totally organic, but I think I'll go w/ the neem first. Funny enough my plants have shown no sign of bugs and what I thought were spider mites, I'm pretty sure now was just a little white spider, as I've found out spider mites are way smaller than what I saw. Anyway now I'm prepped if I do get bugs and I've got enough insecticide for for ten grows!!! Thanks so much for the help, I'm sure I'll need more later

-GT

I too am in love with Neem Oil...thanx to StinkyAttic....I got mine at the local nursery....saying I needed it for powdery mildew...which I do....just didn't say what plant type it was on

they sell it in hardware stores in my town, and all the nurseries ... :smokin: