On Fri, 25 Jul 2008 00:34:05 -0500, "Marie Dodge"
wrote:

OK guys, my tomatoes are still covered with whitefly and their small green
babies that look like minute aphids.

I'll just address the whiteflies.

Where are you located?

About fifteen years ago, these tiny whiteflies showed up in southern
California for the first time. It was terrible. Nothing worked.
Entire trees were stripped.

Ten years later, only a very few plants still suffered, mostly
hibuscus. Today, even the hibuscus stays nearly clear, with no care.

Why?

Well, the local agricultural groups sought out whitefly parasites,
very tiny wasps, and released them. Maybe that helped. However, I
suspect that the local predators also adopted - there seemed far more
tiny spiderwebs for a while!

It's actually all quite fascinating.

When I have cared for infested hibiscus, all that ever worked was
squirting them with soapy water to chase the flies, remove the white
hairy nests and sticky eggs. Twice a week was about right.

J.