I went to water the plants this morning, and out of the corner of my eye noticed 2 microscopic white specks squirming on the floor of the grow tent......being a first time grower, and obviously freaking out, I immediately killed them. Then, still panicking, I lifted up one of the 10 gall root pouches, only to discover a swarm of them! Knowing I obviously had an infestation, I turned to GC, and after reading up a shit ton, I was damn happy to discover that they are springtails, and are actually quite beneficial for the plants!, and so I continued watering, not even caring too much about the tiny little critters pinging off my face as soon as the water hit the coco.....all good, so long as the girls are healthy! I had never seen a single bug in my grow room up until this point (5 weeks into flower), and so I sat and waited for the run off, expecting to see many springtails, which I did....however I also saw 2 other bugs that were way different in appearance, which I now believe could be root aphids. Last week I noticed a shit ton of white frosty type buildup on the side of all of my root pouches, which after reading, I put down to mold being caused by high temp fluctuations......but apparently this is one of the early signs of root aphids. Also in the past week 4 of my 8 girls have began suffering from some considerable leaf clawing and discolouration, which at the time I presumed to be heat stress as they were the closest to the lights, but again, all symptomatic of root aphids. Now, my question is this....what the hell do I do!?!?!? lol......I would hate to lose my plants so close to harvest, and from what I can gather most aphid treatments take longer than a few weeks to become fully effective....any help would be very much appreciated!
http://forum.grasscity.com/sick-plants-problems/1259666-root-aphids-thread-identify-destroy.html My experience ^