What do you do against aphids? - Campus Garden - UA Little Rock (2024)

Often aphids are just a nuisance and do no harm to a plant, but a large infestation can damage your plants. This season they happily inhabited pepper plants, so what do you do about aphids?

Here are a few options:

• Spray the plants with soapy water every few days, especially on the undersides of the leaves. One tablespoon of dishwashing liquid Castile soap per liter of water is sufficient.
• Spray with cayenne pepper and/or neem oil dish soap. Neem oil sprays are available at most garden centers.
• Beat them off with your hand or a garden hose and remove the older leaves.
• Place beneficial insects such as ladybugs or green lacewings on the plants.
• Grow companion plants such as marigolds, garlic and catnip with the pepper plants.

There is a lot of information online about aphid control. Here is a good article specifically about peppers.

https://peppergeek.com/aphids-on-pepper-plants/

Here is a more detailed article on aphids and aphid control.

http://ipm.ucanr.edu/PMG/PESTNOTES/pn7404.html