Applying horticultural oil to your fruit trees and woody landscape plants is very important this winter if you want to reduce pests for next year. Make one application in December and then another in January. You can use a hose end applicator or pump sprayer for taller trees. Pick an unusually warm day without any wind to make an application.
Don't forget to give the bottom of the trunk where it enters the ground an extra squirt because those places and any weeds are where pests like to hide in the winter. Control the weeds, too!
This is a "summer" oil so it can be applied when leaves are out and up to temperatures about 85F.
Pests do not migrate. They survive on your landscape plants and fruit trees until next year when they lay more eggs and start the process all over again. This is your chance to suffocate them!
Insects controlled include:
Aphids, mites, whiteflies, leafhoppers, peach twig borer (wormy peaches), coddling moth (wormy apples), scale insects and many others!
Application:
- Pick a warm day with no wind.
- Use 3 to 4 oz of oil mixed together with 96 to 97 oz of water and mix thoroughly. Spray the trunks and large limbs of fruit trees and ornamental trees and shrubs from the base to as high as possible.
- To be effective the oil spray must come in contact with the overwintering pest.
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| Ultra Pure Dormant Oil, 2 1/2 gal. $95 Makes 150 to 250 gallons of finished spray after mixing |
Some outside reading about oils:
Washington State University
Colorado State University
Viragrow Delivers!
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