I live a new build house - the builders planted a young rowan tree in
the front garden.

In summer, it started dropping leaves and although it never dropped them
all, the tree looks a bit limp and poorly.

At the same time (and again this morning) I found grey dagger
caterpillars on it.

Firstly, should the rowan have dropped its leaves so early, and second,
how harmful is the caterpillar?

ta,
g.

On Sun, 05 Sep 2004 11:40:58 +0100, Fat Freddy's Cat
wrote:

I live a new build house - the builders planted a young rowan tree in
the front garden.

In summer, it started dropping leaves and although it never dropped them
all, the tree looks a bit limp and poorly.

At the same time (and again this morning) I found grey dagger
caterpillars on it.

Firstly, should the rowan have dropped its leaves so early, and second,
how harmful is the caterpillar?

ta,
g.

Don't know about the caterpillar (but obviously it won't be doing the
rowan any actual good), but if the rowan is newly planted earlier this
year, it's unlikely it will have developed a good root action yet, and
it was pretty dry earlier in the summer. Did you water it?


--
Chris

E-mail: christopher[dot]hogg[at]virgin[dot]net