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Pest on Apple Trees
Lazouch
Posts: 4
in Fruit & veg
I have ants very interested in a couple of my apple cordons. This is usually because they're farming aphids, and you can see a few on this picture. But what's the big, non-mobile thing that looks a bit like an apple bud, the size of a rather small ladybird and when you squish it it oozes yellow puss? There are lots of these on the trees that the ants are interested in, but I can't seem to find them on the others.
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One of the 23 or so forms of Scale insects. Various ways of dealing with them. Washing with a strong jet of water, dabbing each one with a cotton bud dipped in Methylated spirits. or organic products containing fatty acids or plant oils/extracts which are available from garden product suppliers. These will need to be applied following the label instructions.
They do need removing as they are sap suckers and may damage the tree by weakening it.
Last edited: 13 April 2017 20:46:15
Agree and definitely need dealing with before they release young which is usually at about the beginning of June. For large ones like that, I usually just scrape them off by hand - messy but effective.
Thanks Bob & Berghill, I'll do my best to kill them with my fingers! Would you use a mild soap solution on the aphids?
The ants seem to choose different trees or bushes each year and I have to keep an eye out for them as the trees really suffer.
Do you think the ants are interested in the scale insects too?
Scale insects, just like aphids, suck sap and excrete sugars which they can't digest and it is that which the ants are after. Try grease bands on the trunks of your trees which should stop the ants climbing up them. Once you prevent the ants 'farming' the aphids and carrying them to the new young growth, then you can try knocking the aphids off with a hose spray or, as you suggest, spray them with a soft soap solution.