MARCH 2024
Boxwood shrub/tree caterpillars conceal themselves deep within the plants. This often becomes apparent when you have trimmed or shaped your plants.
These creatures will create cobweb-like webbing over their feeding area, and devour the box leaves. Check your plants regularly, looking deep inside the plant and around its base.
After around a month, the caterpillar forms a chrysalis which emerges as a box tree moth, which then mates, perpetuating the cycle.
Box tree moths are brown and white-colored moths that fly around boxwood trees at dusk and at night.
The moth will lay its eggs on the undersides of box leaves. These eggs are small, pale yellow and flat and overlap each other.
Larvae can significantly damage boxwood plants if left unchecked. Once the leaves are gone, these pests will consume the stems and bark, leading to its demise.
The entire boxwood shrub must be sprayed, trying to cover both the top and under-side of the leaves, since this is where eggs are laid.
These pests should be treated with horticultural oil in the spring followed by monthly treatments using bifenthrin through fall in order to save the plant and control this insect population.
