I have grown moonflower (ipomoea alba) for several years with great results. But this year I am battling ants that cover the buds causing them to drop off, never opening. I finally bought some soapy organic spray and that seems to work, but now, although the buds fully develop, they only open three quarters of the way. Is it the spray? I have never used it before and can't imagine what else could be causing this.
Moonflower don't fully open -help
Are there any other bugs on the plants? Ants don't usually damage plants, normally when you see them crawling all over something it's because they're enjoying the honeydew that's secreted by things like aphids and scale. Nine times out of ten when I've found ants on my plants I've found one of those types of bugs too, and they're the ones that are doing the real damage. If you don't see anything now then chances are if there was something else you got rid of it with the soap spray too, but if it was fairly recently that you did the soap treatment it's possible that buds already on the plant had already suffered some damage so that's why they're not opening all the way.
I just looked closely and discovered more ants and some tiny brown things. Will have to get a better look in the daylight. I sprayed last week with the soap and then again just now. There was one bloom that was just cut off at the stem. There are eight blooms tonight, 3/4 open again. Could it also be there is a regular size moonflower and a giant one? These blooms look enormous, last year they did not seem that big. If that were so I would think they were too big to fully open maybe?
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