Maple scale

[rkurzend]

We live in southern Indiana and have several well-established (~40 ft) red maples which are suffering in varying degrees from scale on the twigs and also cottony maple scale on the leaves. Two of these are in pretty bad shape - they've been dropping leaves all season and 1 has lost the entire crown of the tree. This just became apparent this year.

What types of treatment are recommended for this problem? Are there good systemic-type fungicides/pesticides we can use to treat the trees ourselves (there are about 12 that need treatment). Are the 2 really sick ones worth saving, or will they probably die anyway (about 30 - 50% of tree defoliated).

Thanks.

 

[Jay Banks]

With as much damage as you discribe these trees sound like they are really stressed. I would recommend having someone licensed (here in Virginia you must have a special license to spray) to evaluate and recommend an aggressive approach to reduce the scale has much as possible.

Then look into a follow-up this coming spring to get a jump on the problem.

Also, you need to try an restore some vigor back to the trees, water, fertilize, prune dead wood and mulch.

 

[John Paul McMillin]

all scales are best controlled during the crawler stage. cottony maple scales crawlers come out in late june and july (one generation) I spray horticultural oil at 2gal/100 or 5Tbl/gal mixed with Tempo at 1.5oz/100. as for the other scale , it would be a good idea to identify it and treat accordingly. Merit is effective on some scales , and is a systemic soil drench or injection , but i dont have my reference book with me at the moment. do not overfertilize your trees because that could increase scale problems. john