Mostly I leave things alone in the garden. The beetles attract the birds and
all that. But here (in Canberra) we've had two unacceptable gum munchers.

One is sawfly larvae (spitfires) which are obnoxious things that nothing
will eat. The other posters have described these.

But the one that really massacred our gums (Mannifera and Scoparia) were
Leaf Beetles (Order Coleoptera). The adults of these are light brown in
colour, hemispherical in shape, with big feet. The grubs are about 2 cm,
cream in colour, flecked with black, with black heads.

Both spitfires and leaf beetle grubs cluster during the day. The leaf
beetles strippped the tops bare on two of our gums. That's when I declared
war on them.

I recommend the hose and gumboot treatment on the group, or less ecological,
a pyrethrum insecticide with a jet spray. Soak the group with the jet. None
has survived this so far. The jet spray lets you hit the target only, up to
about 4 metres, and minimises civilian casualties.

Good luck.

"arien" wrote in message
. au...
We have this little catepillar type beast, which is stripping the leaves
and all that is left is like a skeleton of the leaf. This bug has nearly
killed two of our young gum trees, and is close to engulfing another
larger (still young) gum tree. The garden centre suggested we spray the
trees with carbaryl, but the little blighters don't seem to mind the
stuff at all. Does anyone know what this caterpillar thing is, and what
will kill it (before they kill the trees)?


--
Mel

Please post reply to newsgroup. Reply address isn't valid.