What's wrong with my daphne? Black "egg?" on the back of leaves.

[Johnson]

I saw broken leaves and (possibly) black eggs on the back of leaves. There are also quite some ants on the plant. After searching online, I still could not figure out what's happening to it. Any idea/suggestion to save the daphne plant would be greatly appreciated!

[BradN]

Hi @Johnson . It looks to me as if those raised bumps are scale insects. If so, you should be able to treat them with white oil. You could also remove (and squish) them by hand, depending on how many there are.

Cheers,

Brad

[Adam_W]

Hi @Johnson definitely scale insects. Use eco-oil spray but you do need to cover them all so you’ll need to spray under leaves. 

[Johnson]

Wonderful! I'll go and get the while/eco-oil spray Thanks @Adam_W and @BradN for the suggestions!

[BradN]

Glad we could help!

[Johnson]

Hi @BradN and @Adam_W 

I got the white oil as you recommended and tried to apply it to the plant. However, with a closer look, I found that almost every leaf has been affected (some with big black scale insects and some with tiny yellow scale insects). Given that the size of my daphne plants is about 3 cubic meters (3m*1m*1m) in total, it is a bit impractical to turn over every leaf and apply the white oil. Do you have some suggestions on solutions that can scale to this size?

Cheers

Johnson

[BradN]

Hi @Johnson . I haven't dealt with scale on a large scale myself. The Yates page for scale suggests diluting pest oil concentrate and using it with a sprayer to cover larger areas.

I don't know what kind of sprayer you would need for that. Perhaps Adam, @MitchellMc or @EricL could offer you some advice.

Brad 

[EricL]

Hello @Johnson

In order to help you with your spraying, I suggest using a Garden Pressure Sprayer so that you can reach inside the plant with the wand and not have to manually turn all the leaves over. In order to safely spray the Yates 500ml Pest Oil Concentrate, I suggest using Trojan A1+P2 Half Mask Respirator, safety goggles and disposable gloves. It's important to keep everyone away while you are spraying the plant. Please keep in mind that the oil is a concentrate and must be diluted before use.

Unfortunately, since the entire plant is infested every area of the plant must be sprayed top and bottom. If you miss one spot the infestation will repeat itself. 

If you have any other questions we can help with, please let us know.

Eric