New forum member so apologies if this isn’t posted correctly.
This is SWIM’s first attempt (indoor) and he noticed a fungus gnat in the soil of his Gorilla Glue (ILGM) a few days ago. Yellow sticky tape was put out the day after the first gnat appeared and a dusting of DE was just applied today as soon as the package arrived. So far the tally is at 5 gnats caught by the tape within 3 days. The problem came due to poor drainage in crappy soil that was already on hand because SWIM had no access to quality soil until it was restocked online (health condition so shopping in-store is not a great option during this whole… situation). SWIM would’ve waited for quality soil but the GG is for medicinal purposes and time is of the essence due to a newfound lack of medication, so the grow began anyway.
The plant is doing well enough with EXTREME TLC to compensate for the soil issue until a few days ago when the gnats were spotted. Temp and humidity were consistently in the recommended range the entire time. So far there are no visible signs of distress from the plant besides a slowing of growth. Obviously watering habits are an issue because of inexperience but it’s overwhelmingly due to the poor drainage and the fact that the average outdoor humidity sits between 77-89% every day. New soil of good quality came in the mail 2 days ago but SWIM has been waiting to gauge the gnat situation before transplanting to the 3rd and final container. There are spacial limitations so it’s getting close to forced flowering time.
The problem is that the fungus gnats will be very difficult to fully eradicate in this absolutely garbage soil that refuses to dry out completely, yet there would be a great risk of contaminating the new soil with a transplant. It’s practically a catch-22 situation.
What should SWIM do? Given the life cycle of fungus gnats it would seem like waiting 3-7 days for the DE treatment and sticky tape to take effect would be the best course of action, however with the spacial limitations there is a fear the plant will become too large by that time. With the gardening inexperience and the already-present stress on the plant, training sounds like a bad idea.
Yes, next time high quality soil will be used right off the bat so there’s no need for a lecture on that front. This was a moment of dire circumstance in the pursuit of symptom relief and peaceful sleep. Any and all expert advice is greatly appreciated.
Thanks and stay safe out there.