Spider Mites! Ugh!

As you know, my miniature rose plant has taken the place of a pet in my life, since the dern apartment complex won't let me have a pet. So I love it, nurture it, feed and water it, talk to it, and basically do whatever I can to keep it alive. However, it hasn't been cooperating very much. Yes, it is growing and it is blooming, but it just doesn't look to be very happy about it. Just as soon as I get some hope that maybe it will turn around and flourish, the leaves turn yellow and fall off, and we're back to square one. But yesterday, I finally discovered the culprit. SPIDER MITES! Yuck! In my research about miniature roses, I found that they are especially susceptible to spider mites, and even more so in hot dry climates. Hello! Waco, Texas! So the whole time I've had the rose, I've been half-heartedly spraying it with water, which is supposed to help keep these particular pests at bay. But yesterday, I was finally able to see the signs of a full-blown infestation. These critters live on the underside of leaves and suck all the nutrients out until the leaves turn yellow and fall off. So flipping over the leaves, you can see tiny black specks, looks like someone has doused them with pepper. When your infestation gets really large, you can actually see webs between the leaves. And that's what I saw yesterday. So it was time to go on the attack. I took my spray bottle out there and thoroughly washed BOTH sides of EVERY INDIVIDUAL LEAF. No more half-hearted spraying for me and my beloved rose! So we'll see how quickly it rebounds from this particular attack. From what I read, I'll have to spray it pretty thoroughly every day to keep the mites away. If that turns out to be too hard, I may resort to some kind of pesticide, we'll see. No matter what, though, I am determined to have a lovely, flourishing rose if it's the last thing I do!!!