A potted "sweet mint," for making mint iced tea, has graced our desk for months, but a few weeks ago it began to "look poorly," as my Mom would say. It was already stressed by the dry air of our apartment and the lack of adequate sunlight; I should have taken it outside two months ago. But I love to touch the leaves and enjoy the scent wafting around the desk. A memory, and a tiny little suspicion began to work their way to the forefront of my mind, still dulled by long COVID. Time to pull out the antique, but still extremely useful, microscope.
With some white paper, Scotch tape, two fallen leaves, and after a lot of adjusting and re-adjusting the lens and sliding the paper back and forth on the , the culprit came into view. Two-spotted spider mites. The leaves look very dry and dull to the naked eye, but under the lens, the surfaces cells' transparency is visible, along with microscopic droplets of water, spider mite feces, and long blue-grey threads here and there that might be fungal hyphae.
Because this is an edible, and I don't want to use a chemical pesticide - even a supposedly "organic" one such as a pyrethrin - an alternative form of murder is worth a try. As you can see, I have no qualms about killing certain insects. Experts recommend spraying them off with a hose, but we don't have a hose, or an accessible outdoor spigot, anyway, so I'm trying to drown the evil little monsters. And this plant is too fragile to endure even the kitchen sink sprayer. I absolutely cannot remember if it worked the last time or not. But here goes!
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