Hello Fall…it’s Fungus Gnat Season

As soon as the weather starts to cool and our plants head indoors for the year, we are overrun with fungus gnats.

Fungus gnats are those aggravating tiny flies similar to mosquitoes in appearance that hang around your houseplant’s soil or near lights.  These flies are small between 1/16th to 1/8th of an inch long. The eggs in the wet soil and the larvae have a shiny black heads and whitish-to-translucent bodies.  Fungus gnat larvae consume organic matter, compost, fungi, and root hairs.

Your control options:

Adults Controls

Yellow stick cards: Only way to trap the adults is by using yellow sticky cards hung close to the plant soil.

Larvae Controls

Beneficial Nematodes: Microscopic worms that feed on larvae of fungus gnats and thrips in the soil.

Predatory Beetles: Rove beetles a soil beetle that feeds on small insects such as fungus gnats, thrips, and springtails.  This generalist soil predator prefers wet soils.

Predatory mites: Stratiolaalaps scimitus and Gaeolaelaps gillespiei are mites that live in the soil and feed on small insects, such as fungus, gnats, root mealybugs, thrip pupae, and even overwintering spider mites that are found in the soil.