Fight them on beeches
Vigilance is key to stopping pests enjoying a feeding frenzy on your favourite plants, writes
It’s true – we do make hay while the sun shines. Just witness all those tractors tearing up and down fields, cropping the grass to turn into fodder for farm animals. It’s also true that it’s not only humans that make the most of the good weather – garden pests like to feel the sun on their backs while they wreak havoc on a wide variety of plants.
Where are all the ladybirds when you want them? This year they seem to be in short supply while their favourite food – aphids – are in a feeding frenzy, sucking the sap from a multitude of plants.
Aphids are sap-sucking insects which excrete a sugary substance called honeydew that coats the upper leaf surface and makes the foliage sticky. A black sooty mould may develop on the honeydew, further disfiguring the foliage and weakening the plant.
Cherry aphids have been busy; so have plum aphids, both revealing their presence via curled-up leaves coated with their sticky secretions. Lupins have also come under attack and, of course, greenfly can be seen in increasing numbers on roses.
How gardeners deal with the problem is a matter of debate. Some spray with chemicals, others prefer to blast the little blighters with streams of soapy water, washing them off the plants rather than impregnating the foliage with systemic insecticides that can kill beneficial insects as well as the pests.
Vigilance is the key – check plants regularly and deal with aphids (and other pests such as the vivid-red lily beetle) before they have time to do real damage.
And this year a lot of gardeners are reporting aphid infestations on beech hedges. This is the work of the woolly beech aphid. In late spring, fluffy white patches appear on the underside of beech leaves. Under this covering are pale yellow aphids that are sucking sap from the foliage and young stems
The Latin name for this little pest is Phyllaphis fagi and although it may look like whitefly, it devotes its attention purely to the beech, which, fortunately, is a very hardy plant so it rarely suffers – which means human intervention isn’t usually needed.
Woolly beech aphids overwinter as eggs laid in autumn around buds and in bark crevices. The eggs hatch in spring
– a few weeks after new foliage has appeared.