I have been using your maxthor and boost for the clovermites in my yard. I was leaving the clippings and now I know better. They were under there but since I removed them I seem to have them coming out of the ground. When I spray they’re gone for a few days but then come back. Is the spray working? I don’t understand how they can come back so fast. I also spray the house siding and my house is on a slab so I’m spraying around the foundation, like you told us to do. Similar to the termite job video. None inside thankfully but I’m worried these I keep seeing will get inside. Anything more I can do?
The quick answer is for sure, you can use more product. Here’s why.
CLOVER MITES are very strong meaning it takes a good day or two for any dry treatment to affect them. This is true for many mites but there are other insects which have strong exoskeletons that make them tough. The short list includes pests like GRASSHOPPERS, STINK BUGS and DUNG BEETLES. Now when you’re applying the Maxxthor/Boost, they’ll all succumb to the mixture within a few minutes. But once it dries, that “contact kill” feature no longer applies. At that point, it’s the small particles they’ll be exposed to as they travel through treated soil that eventually kills them. But again, that can take days.
So if you want to insure there are less coming out of the ground and in turn, less that can find your home to start a new infestation, there are two approaches that will squash their hopes before they ever emerge.
The first is to double the amount applied. So if you’re using 1 gallon per 1000 sq/ft of turf? Use 2 gallons. And doubling the amount of chemical per gallon won’t help. It’s more about the water carrying it deeper.
The benefit is that you’ll have deeper penetration and in turn, buy yourself more time in between seeing them again. An easier way to understand this is to imagine you have a 1000 sq/ft yard and are using just 1 gallon to treat it. Now lets imagine you have a waterproof barrier around this same area and can apply 50 gallons of mixture over the same area without having it leak onto the neighbors yard.
As you can well imagine, there would be nothing emerging for weeks if not months. Why? Because all of that water/Maxxthor would be soaking way down into the ground at least 6-12 inches. And taking out all the ones in that range will be creating a larger “clover free buffer zone”. The other benefit of such a treatment would be the band of treated soil. Like the termite job approach of trenching around the foundation, all that dirt with chemical insures more product is absorbed by them faster so in turn, they die faster when they eventually try to break out from below.
Of course using 50 gallons is not suggested. But using 2 or even 3 gallons for the same area can be a good way to take back control of what’s happening.
The second option is get ahead of them. Do this by scheduling treatments before you see them.
I happen to have them emerge from under my drive way at a gap where the cement meets my foundation. I have found that if I start to treat that gap every 2 days when their spring migration starts, I won’t see them after the initial surge. So yes, I’m out there 3 days a week pumping that area with Maxxthor. But after two weeks I stop and most every year, I don’t see them again.
In summary, using more per treatment can get you a longer “clover mite free window” of time. Again, use the same rate/mixture. But instead of using 1-2 gallons of mixed material, use 2-4.
Alternatively, treating before you see them is another surefire method to stay ahead of migrating swarms.
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