what's eating my Palmate Hibiscus? help!

I feel stupid to ask - I am sure I should the answer - but I'm a bit frazzled today with the storms coming (predicting hail...yea us) I spent the morning putting containers and pots under eves (ummm I did an inventory last week - 586 plants...)

Anyways - last year it was the jap. beetle that won on the Palmate - I finally just said let it go it will come back next year - so what is this on the leaves? Is it a bug that is inside it? any thoughts on how to rid the plant of it? so far there's just this one leaf but we all know how that goes!

Leaf miners???

I would get rid of that leaf ASAP and watch for the critters that have likely moved on to other leaves already.

taking your advice to heart I went outside and picked off nearly every leaf and look what one of them had on it are these leaf miners or something else ( I thought leaf miners were on the inside of leafs but could these be adults or something else all together?)

Thanks for your help Ardesia

That is strange, usually the leaf miners tunnel between the upper and lower leaf surfaces and all you see are these pale spaces on the leaf. These guys are just eating the lower surface of the leaf, not all the way through as you would expect from most cats.


I just googled caterpillars on hibiscus and it sounds like they might be saw fly larvae. The remedies were all over the place from harsh chemicals to soapy water. Some suggested BT and others suggested horticultural oils like Neem. Good luck, if you find you have more I would bring them by your extension office and get them to give you an ID.

This message was edited May 10, 2011 5:11 PM

checked on the Hib. out front and it too had numerous ones on it- I plucked off the affected leaves and 'worms' and threw them all in the burn pile as I had some trash to burn...this morning there were only two of them on close inspection so I really appreciate your saying get rid of those leafs - some of them had upwards of 15 on them so...ick...but gone now :) hopefully for good...now to get rid of the last aphids ...argghh...they'll be the death of me yet on the datura's - Lilac LeFluer seems to be the least affected by them and it should be blooming by the weekend - the soap & oil mixture burned alot of the Black Currant Swirls Golden Queens - feel bad I didn't know you were supposed to 'wash' the mixture off after a few hours - but Dat's are so fragile - I've learned not to even use Safer soap on them as it burns the leaves badly - was hoping the homemade remedy would be gentler....oh well - live n learn!

I never knew that either.