What are these clusters of black bugs on my cherry tree leaves?

[tealsofas]

About a month ago we had shot-hole disease due to watering the garden with a sprinkler. I treated the leaves with a fungicide and while we do still have some leaves with shot holes, it’s got better.

Now we’ve just noticed these bugs.

This tree is destined to fail isn’t it 😭

I think they are black aphids and I have them too so will get some neem oil to spray.

Blackfly, the tip leaves of ours get covered in them every year. Not much you can do, they are harmless but very unsightly, won't affect cropping. They do have natural predators, ladybirds, lacewings etc so may die down as the summer progresses.

Meanwhile, you can run the worst affected leaves between your fingers and squash them. (Just keep telling yourself they’re mainly water)

We had some aphids on our willow which became a wasp trap. Watch out as I ended up having to get rid of the tree as it made it impossible to use the garden in summer.

We get this on our cherry tree every year. I keep meaning to try and get rid of them and always forget. And I also keep meaning to net the tree when it starts to fruit before the birds take every cherry. It happens within the space of a couple of days. Which I always forget to do too. We’ve never eaten a cherry from our own tree!

I have these and my poor cherry tree is totally fucked, I've tried everything from ladybird-friendly planting to encourage them to eat the blackfly (the ladybird larvae love em but there's so many more than they can eat), scrubbing the tree with fairy liquid in winter to get the eggs off, pesticides... No joy 😖 the blackfly are no being "farmed" by ants which only makes it worse. DH wants rid of the tree and tbf it's a bit of an eyesore now but it'll make me sad!

Ours is too big to net. Most years it doesn't fruit much but every 5 years or so we get an absolute bumper crop. However this year it barely flowered so not expecting anything.

We only got the tree recently so as yet I am absolutely unsure as to whether it actually produces cherries or not! I will be so disappointed if this tree is diseased or infested

Could I just cut the affected leaves off, along with the bugs?

Do you have ants in the garden? Ants farm these aphids (they drink their poo!) and attack all the natural predators like ladybirds. I’ve had success in getting rid of them by putting organic glue around the trunk of the tree which prevents the ants from doing their farming, and then washing the aphids off with a water spray.
See if there are ants running along the branches.

This stuff stops the ants. Once you get rid of the ant farming you stand a chance of getting rid of the other pests.
https://www.organiccatalogue.com/equipment/plant-protection/pest-control/insect-glue-tube-large_mh-50346?feed=shopping&acq_source=%5Bmed:ad%5D%5Bsrc:g%5D%5Bcid:12086848742%5D%5Bgid:147586996537%5D&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_id=12086848742&adgroup_id=147586996537&source=OGWEBPPC&gad=1&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIwf7R-cOv_wIVF8DtCh2RkQaWEAQYASABEgJhO_D_BwE

Yes, if it;s not cutting too much off or making large cuts.

It's how you deal with them on broad beans.

I've tried glue bands round the trunk to stop ant farming but it didn't make a lot of difference.

Many years ago a neighbour told me to plant chives under my cherry tree to keep black flies away. Not had an issue since.

I had this on my apple last week.

Yesterday I spotted loads of ladybird larvae on the leaves.

If you get rid of them then predators that eat them will never arrive.

I washed them off with a hose. I get them on my cherry tree. Interesting about the chives.

I could easily try chives, I have lots of the elsewhere in my garden.

I got my cherry tree 2 years ago and these black aphids infected it last year and now! It wrecked the tree last year and my dp said to get rid but it would make me sad too. So watching, waiting and pruning atm.

The birds and ladybirds don't always get these so I squish where possible, then as soon as you can, on an overcast day or in the evening/early morning, use a neem-oil based spray to spray everywhere you see them. Wait 5-7 days and give another spray to catch any stragglers.

PS forgot to say, give the plant a feed and water to revitalise it as well. Seaweed based fertiliser is good for this.

I make up a concoction of diluted washing up liquid with a tsp of vegetable oil and a tsp of bicarb. Shake it like mad and you get a foam (rather than just a liquid that runs off) that you can work into the leaves to both coat and squish the aphids.

I think that it is working but we have had to do a few applications.

@Helenahandkart @Smoothyloopy Chives & glue on the shopping list!

I remembered why I stopped the glue bands, it wasn't just that they didn't work very well (paint on glue sounds better as they can't get behind it like they can with bands). It was because we got cats and I had visions of coming home from work to find a cat glued to the tree trunk!

Our tree is too big to spray, it's as high as the house and nearly as wide. Unfortunately we are in a conservation area so can't prune it without permission.

Aha! Yes we do have ants, and last week I overheard the neighbour saying to his son “look at all these ants” so I think they’re coming from next door. I’ll have a look to see if I can see ants on the branches and then look to see what I can do to get rid of ants!

Funny as I always thought ants were the good guys!

We get this on our cherry tree too - it's too big to reach the top branches/tips so just hoping the predators kick in. Seriously considering buying ladybirds to help.