Hello All! My wife and I are fairly new to gardening and lawn maintenance and have found these forums to be lifesavers.
Recently while mowing the side lawn, I noticed that the hedges along the side of the house look to be covered in some type of tiny white and black specks. They are kind of grainy and can removed from the leaves just by rubbing on them. The hedges on the back half of the house are covered in these things. We can't tell if they are some type of egg or other product from an insect, or if they are a fungal growth, or none of the above.
Mostly, we want to know how harmful these are to our hedges, whether they can spread and how to make our plants healthy again!
I'm attaching photos of the leaves for reference. If it helps, our location is in Central Texas.
Any assistance or advice would be much appreciated. It seems the users of these forums are amazingly friendly and eager to help, and to new homeowners like us, your input is priceless!
Trying to Identify Pest/Disease on Our Hedges & How to Fix
I think the black spots are bug droppings, and the white may be the cast off skins of the bugs.
I would start by spraying with something mild like insecticidal soap, or just a strong blast from the hose.
Then monitor the new growth to see what comes back, and see if you can ID whatever it is. If you need to, you can then target that pest with a pesticide that acts on a narrow range of pests.
Some pests have a short season of growth, then go dormant as eggs or pupa until next spring, so you may not see any more. Other pests keep on coming back as long as the weather is right for them.
In the mean time, I would fertilize and mulch the shrubs, and deep soak them when you water to encourage some recovery. Do not water too often. Excess water and fertilizer can produce too much soft, new growth that is highly attractive to the bugs. Slow release fertilizer and infrequent, deep soaking is best.
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