Pests & diseases › Leaf Miners
Leaf Miners
Tiny fly larvae tunnel between leaf surfaces, leaving winding pale trails. Affects beets, chard, spinach, columbine.
Symptoms
- Pale winding tunnels visible through translucent leaves
- Brown blistered patches where tunnels join
- Reduced vigor but rarely fatal
Lifecycle
Two or three generations per year.
What to do
- Pick off and bag affected leaves before larvae mature
- Squash larvae visible inside the mine
If it's bad
- Spinosad (limited effectiveness, larvae protected inside leaf)
Stop it coming back
- Floating row cover from emergence
- Three-year rotation
- Bag all infested foliage at season end
Crops it goes for
Plan the plot, track every sowing, cook the harvest
Sowing reminders and harvest forecasts for your own frost dates, the Seed Tin, Scan Centre for any label or packet, and the Potty Mouth Garden Club. Free to start.