I have never had this problem before and this year we are loaded with this problem. Its not just me its others as well they say the same thing never seen this before. My fruit trees are terrible with this i took all the affected leaves off twice. And it just keeps coming as long as theres new growth there there any suggestions anything would help thanks ...Dana
First thing to do is quit pulling off the leaves. You are doing much more damage to the tree than the leaf miner. A leaf with leaf miner damage is still productive even if ugly and the sight of the damage boils your blood.
The first flushes in the spring have the least leaf miner activity but the second and third flushes are attacked much more severely.
If you are very observant and check your trees every single day you can squish them inside the leaf, before they cause much damage but this is only practical on small trees and it is a pain to keep up the vigilance.
Horticultural oils work but you have to keep up with the rhythm of the flushes. A leaf miner will not lay an egg on a leaf that has oil on it.
Spinosad and agrimek will kill the leaf miner inside the leaf but they will not make the damage go away.
Pheromone traps will trap the males and if you have just a few trees they have been successful at preventing damage. Normally the traps are used to detect the presence of the leaf miner. They are expensive but you might share the cost with neighbors. Here is the link http://www.iscatech.com/ecommerce/
Oldude
Danasplants, I had really bad infestations and was told to spray SOAK the trees AND the ground under them with spinosad after the fruit had been picked and before the spring growth spurt commenced. It reduced the problem the next year by about 90%. It seems the insects or their eggs enter the soil under the trees and wait for the spring growth flush to re-infest the trees.
A horticulture expert told me this only worked because my orchard is fairly isolated. She said that if I had neighboring orchards that were not treated, my efforts would have been to little avail. The good news is the miners do not effect the fruit and cause little lasting damage to the trees. But they sure do make them look ugly. Don
Thank you very much to both of you for your great information. There is not many fruit trees close to me I have 20 trees here half are very young thats the bad part just put in a dozen young trees last year. They were doing great till this. I think this mess came with some of the trees a bought at Lowes the others were bought from a citrus nursery. This weekend I will go find spinosad and douse them good. Thanks again for the info! :)
With 20 trees I would consider buying the Conserve SC concentrate. It’s has 11.6% spinosad, it’s expensive, but cheaper than continuously purchasing the small bottles.
Oldude
Yep. You're going to have to watch for new growth a spray all the trees down and repeat. If you're fairly isolated the miners should come under control.
