dibbons
Well-Known Member
My garden is plagued by aphids, and has been. Some other plants have brown curly leaves for some reason. I water like hell, and fertilize occasionally, but the non-native plants seem to fair far worse (but the aphids have destroyed completely one of my baby cactus!).
Purchased some neem oil (online) and the recommended dosage is about 5 ounces per gallon of water. Now I don't know the concentration of the neem oil in the bottle (I can't find it listed anywhere).
So I filled my newly purchased plastic home sprayer with the adjustable brass nozzle (you pump it 15 or more times to pressurize it) with about 2 gallons of water and added 10 ozs. of the neem oil on top (the neem oil looks and pours pretty much like honey). I shook the container/sprayer for what I thought was a long time and began to spray. What came out seemed to be the consistency of water and evaporated almost immediately (it was already 11:00 o'clock in the morning).
When the sprayer was empty, I went to rinse it out and found quite of bit of the oil in the very bottom of the sprayer. I know oil floats on water, so it seems maybe a good amount of oil did not emulsify with the water during my shaking.
So I wonder what (if anything) I did wrong and what I can do next time to get better coverage? Thank you.
Purchased some neem oil (online) and the recommended dosage is about 5 ounces per gallon of water. Now I don't know the concentration of the neem oil in the bottle (I can't find it listed anywhere).
So I filled my newly purchased plastic home sprayer with the adjustable brass nozzle (you pump it 15 or more times to pressurize it) with about 2 gallons of water and added 10 ozs. of the neem oil on top (the neem oil looks and pours pretty much like honey). I shook the container/sprayer for what I thought was a long time and began to spray. What came out seemed to be the consistency of water and evaporated almost immediately (it was already 11:00 o'clock in the morning).
When the sprayer was empty, I went to rinse it out and found quite of bit of the oil in the very bottom of the sprayer. I know oil floats on water, so it seems maybe a good amount of oil did not emulsify with the water during my shaking.
So I wonder what (if anything) I did wrong and what I can do next time to get better coverage? Thank you.
