Small, brown, leafy twigs are falling from my oak tree. What could be the problem?
The twig girdler is probably responsible for the falling twigs if the twigs appear as if they were neatly cut from the tree with a pruning shears. The twig girdler is a long-horned beetle about three-fourths of an inch long, stout, grayish-brown with a lighter colored band across its wings. The antennae are as long as the body. Adult beetles typically begin to emerge in mid-August and continue through early October. The adult female chews a neat, V-shaped groove around and partly through the small twig. This leaves the twig attached to the tree by a thin center core of wood. The beetle then deposits an egg in the bark of the twig section beyond the cut. The portion of the twig beyond the cut dies quickly and falls to the ground because of wind or its own weight. The egg within each fallen twig hatches into a tiny larva that bores into the dead twig to feed. The small larva stays inside the fallen twig through the winter and resumes feeding and consumes most of the wood the following sp
Related Questions
- My tulip tree has lots of small, brown bumps on its twigs and small branches and is depositing a sticky goo on everything under it. Serious?
- What are those small, brown, round balls that are falling on my driveway from an overhanging pin oak tree?
- Small, brown, leafy twigs are falling from my oak tree. What could be the problem?
