Help - my lovely climbing rose has aphids,,greenfly and some sort of cottony looking insect on it

[lucyellensmum]

I don't want to use insecticide as i dont want chemicals on the garden and i have a 20m old daughter, also the rose is planted in a bed where i have planted lots of herbs i intend to eat. I know about the lady birds but not sure how i attract them. I have planted some marigolds uner it today, also have corriander which apparently repels greenfly. My mothers rose has been decimated by the little bastards and i like my rose i do!

my uncle sprays his roses with soapy water.

washing up liquid in a spray bottle with water, appaerntly does the track....

My dad also uses soapy water in a spray bottle.

Not too soapy, mind, just a few drops should do it if you shake up the bottle.

you can buy lady birds from wigglywigglers.com. also some other natural greenfly predator (name escapes me right now) and a ladybird house too

lacewings are the other ones. both here

buy ladybirds ??? whatever next - actually thats brilliant, i did wonder. But wont they fly away - i am going to tell my husband now that im buying some ladybirds, i think he may laugh Defo going for the bug house though, how cool is that.

My mum uses soapy water, i'll do that too then, i thought she was mad!

don;t do what I did when they arrive through the post - I dropped them in the house and had to grub about on the floor trying to find them all.

my DH said that he is not wasting his effing money on effing ladybirds! Oh, hes so predictable, i do love him!

actually - just thought of something else - apparently ladybirds come out later than greenfly - so it's quite common for roses to look bad at this time of year - it's not quite warm enough for the ladybirds yet.

i bought ladybirds once, they did not hang around to eat the aphids, bloody expensive too. a good water and feed will help poor plant to cope with infestation. you can also shoot insects off with a good strong hose, good fun but do it now before they flower or ladybirds arrive.

lol fishie, sorry but it does sound rather mad to buy lady birds although i certainly considered it, hubby still pissing himself, i wish i had thought of it though, what a way to make money.