THING on my acer

[TheOneWithTheNicestSmile]

What is it, please?

Do I just scrape it all off or should I be doing something extra? (Or different?)

TIA

Ewwww! Totally unrelated but our Acer suddenly lost all it's leaves this week!

Oh God - I've had this on my acer, and more recently on my skimmia and I've just spent an unpleasant half hour scraping them off and spraying with soapy water and Provado insecticide. They are scale insects.

shiver

Ewwww indeed

The leaves did start drying out & turning brown early last year (didn't drop off but it's quite a big tree)

Thanks, TheFarSide - I'll try the scraping & soap first & see about insecticide next week (after it stops raining this weekend )

The leaves are already browning at the edges. Crikey.

I have scraped a lot off (with a knife) & squirted the white fluff with soapy water - most of that seemed to fall off.

Some of it is out of reach, I'll have a go at that another time.

I didn't collect the little brown bits, I just dropped them, will they come back?

So do I spray Provado on the things themselves or on the leaves?

I'm not much of an expert but I think the brown bits are the scale and the white bits possibly the eggs. The scale is a protective cover so they need to be scraped off before spraying. The Provado I have is systemic which I think means it penetrates the plant and the insects die indirectly from sucking the sap as well as directly if the spray lands on them. I sprayed it all over the bark and leaves (usually you should try to spray the undersides of the leaves too but no point if no scale on them).

Probably best to Google rather than listen to me though

they are scale insects
wipe them off with a babywipe