How to get rid of and Prevent Mealybugs on Succulents

You just bought some beautiful succulents from your local nursery, or even better online with 3 day shipping. Everything is going so well, your succulents are growing healthy, colorful, and beautiful.

One day you take a look at your beautiful succulents, and you notice a white fuzzy substance crawling on your plant. And you are just wondering “what the heck is that”. Don’t worry everything will be okay!

The white fuzzy powder like sticky stuff crawling on your succulent are mealy bugs! Mealybugs are the most common pest problems for succulents, and if you don’t solve this your succulent may slowly wither and die. 

In this article we are going to explain what are mealybugs, how to get rid of them, and how to prevent them from happening again.

In this article we are going to explain what are mealybugs, how to get rid of them, and how to prevent them from happening again.

 

Let’s dive in!

WHAT ARE MEALY BUGS?

Mealybugs are common nasty little houseplant pests that like to eat new growth on succulents, and other plants. Nobody can really tell you how they appeared on your succulent, but most of the time it’s because of overwatering. They are mainly indoor pests but that doesn’t mean they can appear on your outdoor succulents.

The white fuzzy little guys like to hang out under the leaves of succulents, which makes them difficult to spot. Most growers don’t even spot them, until they look at their succulent and it looks deform. 

If mealybugs aren’t treated quickly, they will spread all over your succulent and move over to other succulents. Surprisingly, they move very quickly, this is why growers get so frustrated with them because they are fast moving bugs that kill your succulent. 

A female mealybug can lay about 600 eggs! Oh, and not to mention those eggs only take about 6 days to hatch! Yup, these bugs are a problem, and you must do something about it!

HOW DO YOU GET RID OF MEALYBUGS?

The first thing you should do to get rid of mealybugs is to simply move your succulent with mealybugs away from other succulents without them. 

Take your succulent out of its pot or planter, and also remove the dirt out of the pot. Gently rinse your succulent with water. Clean the pot completely with just soap and water. You do this because you want to make sure all of the eggs are completely gone out of the pot and soil. (Make sure to throw your soil away)

After letting your succulent, and pot dry, replant your succulent with new succulent soil. 

Now after you do that it’s time to get to work! Let’s kill these mealybugs!

You are probably thinking just regular pesticide killer will do just fine. It definitely can, but some chemicals like that can do some harm to your succulents, so we don’t use pesticide killer chemicals!

We use regular rubbing alcohol!

Rubbing alcohol? Wouldn’t that hurt your succulent?

Nope! The great thing about rubbing alcohol is it is 100% completely safe for succulents. Alcohol will evaporate in a couple minutes, that’s why it won’t kill your succulent. 

Get some rubbing alcohol, and put it in a small spray bottle. Using a spray bottle is the most effective, and easiest way to do this. 

To kill the mealybugs, simply spray the alcohol directly on the mealybug wherever it is sitting. You will notice in a couple of minutes that the mealybug is slowly disintegrating, and what will be left over is a black/brown bug that’s very small will be left.

Just one spray of alcohol will do, unless you miss the mealybug directly then go ahead and spray more. Make sure you get all of them, and if you didn’t don’t worry! Just continue to spray until you don’t see them anymore!

ANY OTHER WAYS TO KILL MEALYBUGS?

Yes there are other way to kill mealybugs. A lot of succulent growers use dish soap and water and they spray and dab it on the mealybugs. This works really well as well, it doesn’t really kill the mealybugs, but it will make them go away and get unattractive from the succulent. This is an amazing alternative, but the best and easiest way is to just use rubbing alcohol, which will kill the mealybugs very easily.

HOW TO PREVENT MEALYBUGS

To prevent mealybugs, it is important to stop the spread before it is too late. Make sure to keep an eye on your succulents here and there to make sure you there’s none. 

A sign of mealybugs will be noticing ants near your succulents. Ants will be around your succulents because mealybugs discharge sweet water, making the ants get a little taste. 

Make sure to keep your succulent area clean and dry, also make sure nothing is rotting near your succulents. 

OTHER SUCCULENTS PESTS TO WATCH OUT FOR

There are also other succulent pests that love succulents, mealybugs aren’t the only ones! 

GNATS OR FRUIT FLIES

A lot of succulent growers experience gnats or fruit flies attacking their succulents. This happens a lot and it’s very common due to watering your succulents. When watering your succulents, it’s very important that you let the soil dry out completely. Gnats and fruit flies are attractive to water, especially water the drips down from succulent leaves.

It’s very important that you use fast/well draining succulent soil so the water can dry very quickly. This helps prevent the gnats or fruit flies because there will be no excess water left over in the pot and soil.

APHIDS

Aphids are also another succulent pest to look out for. Many many succulent growers out there deal with aphids, they are a big pain!

To get rid of aphids, it’s very similar to getting rid of mealybugs. You will just need to use rubbing alcohol or water and dish soap that we recommended. You can also just rinse them off with your gardening hose, that will easily do the trick as well. 

SPIDER MITES

Spider mites are very common succulent pests as well. Again, like mealybugs to get rid of spider mites rubbing alcohol, water, or dish soap will do the trick.

SCALE ON SUCCULENTS

To get rid of scale on succulents just simply use safer soap and spray them off the succulent. This isn’t really a big deal but a lot of succulent growers get annoyed with them. 

ANTS

Ants are the last succulent pests on our list. Ants are very very common because they are attractive to sweet things. When a succulent leaf falls off, it will actually release some of the juices in the soil. Those juices do contain sugar, which is why ants are on the soil or on the succulent. They are attractive to sugar so they attack the succulent.

To get rid of ants on succulents you just need to simply rinse off the succulent with your garden hose or sink. This will get all the ants off and all of the excess sugar off the succulent and dirt. To prevent ants on succulents you should pick up every single succulent leaf that falls off into the soil. This will prevent sugars getting released into the soil.

There you have it! Now you know what that white fuzzy thing is! Mealybugs!!

You now know what mealybugs are, how to get rid of them, and how to prevent them! Mealybugs are super annoying and will do anything to kill your beautiful succulents! It is your job to protect your babies! You now know how to do it!

Mealybugs and all of these other pests are very important to get rid of and prevent. They will continue to attack your succulent and eventually harm the succulent. You now know how to get rid of mealybugs and the rest of the succulent pests that we mentioned.

Thank You!

Thank you for visiting our website and reading our article. We hope we brought value, and great information to you today. Our goal is to help fellow succulent lovers like you! Any questions or if you’d like more tips email us or comment below! 

If you are interested in buying live succulents, soil, cuttings, etc. We have them available here on our website. Go to our homepage, or click the links in our articles for more information.

We thank you so much for your time.

Thank You!

Ramsey Succulents

Family Owned & Operated