[Delphinus]

Yeah, I encounter this problem if I take plants indoors too, many many unwelcome hitch-hikers. Those black aphids are pretty icky.

Hate to say it but I think you need to separate the fish from the plants. Then at least you have some options for treating the plants if necessary.

The safest solution would involve ordering a predator insect, like ladybugs, but the problem is this is not the most practical of solutions for inside a home (if you had a greenhouse, however, ...).

As far as insecticides though. You may find that it's getting rather hard to find anything stronger than "soap." A lot of insecticides and pesticides have just been plum-taken off the market. I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, it's good that dangerous products are not easy to get ahold of, and probably this is the best for the environment and blah blah blah. But in the meantime. What the halle are we supposed to do about these icky creatures invading our home? When I moaned to the guy at Green Gate about how hard it was gonna be to wash the scale insects of my pygmy date plan (which has thorns) he said "well if the plant is worth it to you, you will wash it." I said, "but they'll come back." He said: "if the plant is worth it to you, you will wash it again." I washed it once. They came back. I ended up throwing the plant out. The plant looked like crap, no wonder, with all these icky sticky barnacles sucking the life out of it. Scale on some plants is, I guess, basically the end of them. This is ridiculous. I figure, if I ever get another, I want a guarantee in writing from the grower that it doesn't have scale. If I'm not allowed to treat the plant properly, then I don't think it's an unreasonable condition to ask for one that's not pre-infested. Yeah, right, like that'll ever happen.

Not that any of this helps you. Sorry for the rant. It's just something that "bugs" me.

Basically my pond plants get isolated because of the bugs phenomenon. Yeah, they'll die back but with luck they'll come back in the spring (at least the irises have so far always come back). But yeah, I think we need a better solution for overwintering pond stock. ... If you figure it out, can you let me know too?