🌿 Plant Help
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🗣 Discussion
I brought home a monstera, a money tree, and a bird of paradise about two weeks ago. I washed them outside, sprayed neem because I thought that was the responsible plant parent thing, and put them near an east window with a grow light. Now the newest monstera leaf is unfurling with little dark spots and a few weird scratches. I also see some pale marks on one older leaf. I do not see bugs, but I also do not trust my eyes because thrips look like punctuation. Should I treat for thrips immediately or could this be damage from shipping, neem, light, or me being too intense?
Thrips love new growth, so you are not wrong to check. Use a flashlight and look at the backs of leaves, along veins, and where the petiole meets the stem. Also tap leaves over white paper. If anything tiny moves, that is useful info.
Neem plus grow light can absolutely spot tender leaves, especially if the spray sat on the leaf. I would rinse the leaves, keep it out of direct strong light for a couple days, and inspect before going nuclear.
Quarantine the new plants from the rest of your collection while you figure it out. You can be cautious without treating everything immediately. Take photos of the marks now, then compare in 3 to 5 days.
If you do confirm thrips, treat in rounds. One spray and done usually fails because eggs are protected inside tissue. Follow the label for whatever product you use and repeat at the interval listed.
Blue sticky cards caught thrips for me before I saw them on the plant. Yellow traps caught gnats. Not perfect science, but it gave me a clue.
New leaves often show damage that happened before you owned the plant. If the marks are only on the unfurling leaf and no new spots appear after it hardens, I would not assume infestation yet.
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