The gall of these wasps – attacking my lemon tree

An important part of tending your garden is learning about plant protection. Recently I discovered grwoths within my dwarf lemon tree that I had kind of ignored.

As it turns out they are pretty serious and need to be tended to.

The Nursery. Lots of baby gall wasps hatching away in here

Citrus Gall wasps

They appear to lay their eggs in young fresh stems from August on. The growths are the young hatching and need to be cut off and burnt or wrapped in plastic and throw into the garbage. All sources state to not put into your compost!

I guess I best cut these out now, and monitor much more closely come spring this year.

You can see the small pin prick holes that they can get out of.

A guide from NSW Primary Industries on growing Lemons looks reasonable too

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/137723/11-lemon-pests.pdf This guide particularly identifies all the different types of pest and disease that affect Lemon in Australia. Will now have to research organic types of treatments.

Resources:

I love this fact sheet, with humour:

http://www.sgaonline.org.au/info_citrus_gall_wasp.html

http://www.dpi.nsw.gov.au/aboutus/services/collections/scientific-illustrations/zeck/citrus-gall-wasp

http://gardenworld.net.au/gardenworld/2009/06/citrus-gall-wasp-causes-lumps-in-the-lemon-tree.html

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