Aphids - They Are Everywhere !!

Send 'em down here TheE. We'll make Aphidsicles out of them

On a more serious note... consider this TheE:

Life History -The entire life cycle may be spent on one host plant. Reproduction is by birth of live young throughout the growing season. In late fall, a generation of males and females is produced. These mate, and females then lay eggs on the rose canes. The eggs are the overwintering form. In spring as new growth resumes, the eggs hatch and the tiny nymphs begin to feed.

Source: http://ipm.ncsu.edu/AG189/html/Rose_Aphid.HTML (NC state university)

Wanna know something really interesting about aphids? From spring to autumn females reproduce asexually (i.e. without a male) and give birth to live young that are female clones of themselves. This is known as parthenogenisis and allows a species to quickly colonise new territory (like fresh new rose growth), without the need to find mates etc. Then in autumn aphids produce a 'crop' of males allowing them to reproduce sexually in preparation for the coming winter when the fertilised females will lay their eggs on the rose canes where they will survive the winter and be ready to hatch in spring to wreak havoc on our roses with a fresh onslaught from a new generation of aphids, who then start the process again... attack of the clone army style! The key to controlling any pest or disease is to understand its lifecycle and pick a point in it where you might be able to disrupt it. There is no point really attacking aphids during the warmer months because if you miss just one female she will be able to clone herself a million times (exaggerating for dramatic license lol) again in no time at all but if I wanted to pick a time when the aphid army was at its most vulnerable I would choose NOW when they are busy getting funky aphid style to lay their eggs because the winter will kill them off. If there is no eggs then there will be fewer aphids come spring . They can, of course, fly and you will get new recruits from next door etc but it would be a good time to put a dent in their local number now and reduce the recruitment for next spring. Then... if it was me... with numbers now greatly reduced, I would then look into more environmentally friendly methods of control... like biological control (did you know you can actually buy batches of lady beetles???? I didn't know that until recently ). Keep in mind that it has been shown that aphids dislodged from their host plant will rarely find their way back onto it and will die in the process of trying so a good blast with a strong jet of water is a clean way to deal with the problem.