An orchid sends up a promising flower spike, the buds begin to swell, and then something goes wrong. Buds develop a scorched appearance, petals open with pale scars or distorted […]

The answer changes considerably depending on what the thrips has landed on. A few thrips crawling across a person’s sleeve are usually little more than a nuisance, while the same […]

Something tiny and narrow is crawling across a leaf, but that alone does not make it a thrips. Several insects and other arthropods can resemble thrips when viewed without magnification, […]

Silvery streaks appear across a leaf. New growth opens twisted or scarred. A flower develops strange discoloration, and tiny black specks show up beside the damaged tissue. These clues can […]

A houseplant leaf that once looked uniformly green may begin developing strange silver patches, pale streaks, tiny black dots, or distorted new growth. Those changes are easy to dismiss as […]

A rose bud can look perfectly healthy from the outside while thrips are already feeding between the tightly packed petals. The evidence often appears only when the flower begins to […]

A natural thrips-control plan works best when it starts with removal rather than a bottle. Washing insects from leaves, cutting away heavily infested growth, isolating affected houseplants, removing plant debris, […]

Thrips are unusually difficult to control with insecticides because they feed inside buds, flowers, shoot tips, and other protected plant tissue. Their eggs are also commonly inserted into plant tissue, […]