On one branch on my peach tree there are hese little toothpick sided holes. What are they? A borer?
Since nobody else is answering I will take a stab. If the holes are in a row its woodpecker or similar. If they are completely random it seems like its some boring beetle. Both of these prefer dead wood to bore in to.
Scott
I would say Scott is on the right track here. I would add that it is possibly both as a woodpecker don’t just peck randomly but are usually after meal.
I’d think some bird too. I had a string of holes like that on my ER Cherry tree a few years ago and posted the pix, Fruitnut responded and said Woodpecker for sure. I hadn’t assumed bird damage since it was on healthy wood. But if FN & Scott think Woodpecker, that’s good enough for me!
I could also be wrong here (just thinking out loud) but don’t borers generally prefer thicker wood to bore into and lay eggs, etc.? And being up there in the Far North, wouldn’t it be too early for borer activity? Have they woke up yet, or is that maybe some damage from last year?
scott
I just lost a paw paw and half of a gold plum to ambrosia beetles. I have never had this type of problem before. The gold plum will still die according to what I have found out about the bug. You have to start spraying in early spring mid February . In my area. MSU talks like the bug is just minor problem. In my book the nation better look out. I read more and more trees are falling to this bug. In my fruit trees I have never started spraying till after all blooms for bugs. These beetles have to be sprayed while some trees are still in bloom. I sprayed the other day being very careful . Don’t know if I covered enough of the trees to help. The beetles were on some branches high up in the tree not just on the bottom. The tree had no beetles on the bottom of the tree. Another thing that every one seems to think is the tree has to be sick or in poor health. My gold plum and paw paw were in good health. People better start looking real close. I think this is going to be a lot bigger problem than anybody is saying. PS if one beetle boars into your tree it will more than likely DIE the beetle caries a fungi that is deadly to the tree. This is just my thought about holes in the tree if it is the beetle in about 2 weeks you will see little tooth pick looking saw dust coming out of the holes .
I think its an ambroia bettle. The little holes look similar to pictures I found on the web. Best thing to do is just prune out that branch?
Yes, get it out and look around at nearby areas for any other infestation. And keep checking periodically.
This and SWD are two new pests I have yet to see … not looking forward!
Scott
After pruning it out could you maybe carefully slice the branch in two with a razor knife to see if you can find any bugs? If you find some put them in a jar and take a photo of them.
Could it be the shothole borer? They infect a number of fruit trees including peach. They emerge in April or May and will infect twigs and small branches.
Shothole borer.
Ambrosia beetles are bad news, I find them in pomegranate, plums and peaches.
They will kill your trees. Prune them out and burn the limbs.
Shothole borers seem to like older less healthy trees.
Trees can live with shothole borer unless bacterial canker gets in the wounds.
SHOTHOLE BORER and AMBROSIA BEETLES PDF
http://www.ent.uga.edu/peach/peachhbk/insects/shotholeborer.pdf
I had these these tiny holes in my trees in 2017 and lost 4 trees. Last year I sprayed the trunks with Sevin and didn’t lose any trees. This year I don’t want to take the chance of losing trees but I don’t want to spray Sevin if I don’t have to. Is there anyway to find out if these beetles are present without letting couple of trees go without spray and fall victim to them?
They are attracted to ethanol, you can make traps with water bottles: Catching Beetles | Ambrosia Symbiosis
Or if you can cut fresh “weed” trees you can drill into them and fill them with ethanol. https://agfax.com/2018/02/23/georgia-pecans-making-your-own-ambrosia-beetle-traps/
Last year I had a few container figs get eaten by voles, almost all of the bark on the trees, and left them with the rest to trap the ambrosia beetles in the area. They ended up full of holes but no healthy trees were damaged, I burned them in late spring.
The year I lost trees. I hung ethanol trap bottle on a tree. But no beetle got in there. I did this After the damage was done and after I noticed trees are surely gone. Maybe my timing was off. Or maybe they had enough dead trees in the yard not to bother with a bottle.
That to me looks like cicada. Just my stab… The line that is about halfway up… unless you’re talking about the two look like holes towards the bottom.
I had an ethanol bottle trap last year too and only caught a couple, the vole damaged fig trees were way more attractive. If I don’t have any damaged trees this year I will probably try the fresh wood traps.