mysterious red eggs and scales on serissa foetida

[mutsumi]

Hello,

I am wondering if anyone here would be able to tell what are these red eggs on my serissa foetida?

I have been gifted this little tree last September and it was doing pretty well in my bathroom window (south-facing), it was flowering for a while and there has been lots of new growth. At one point some of the leaves started turning brown at the tips and falling off. I have since moved the tree under the artificial grow lights and it is still doing ok but leaves are still turning brown at the tips and then falling off.

Just a couple of days ago I have looked very closely with my little jewelry microscope and discovered a bunch of tiny red eggs on the underside of some of the leaves and all over the bark. You will see this in the pics below (taken with Opti-TekSkope). I have also managed to see one tiny black bug with red antennas just a little bit bigger than the red eggs, but I didn't manage to take a photo. On top of that, I discovered scales, the bigger ones I have been able to physically remove but the smaller ones are so small that I am now looking into what would be the best way to get rid of them.

In the meantime, I am trying to find out what species the red eggs belong to. If anyone has any ideas, I'd be happy to hear them!

 

[Forsoothe!]

Aarrrrrgggah!

 

[sorce]

Burn it all!

Welcome to Crazy!

Sorce

 

[HorseloverFat]

Aarrrrrgggah!

I had this EXACT same noise-response!!! Seriously... I couldn’t spell it better if I wanted to.

To OP: That’s terrifying!

...I’m really sorry.

Looks like your “bugs” are trying to run the roost...

Act now (whatever that action may be).

 

[mutsumi]

I decided to give the serissa a bath with marius-fabre savon noir and I got to see a few more interesting things. The red eggs were present even on some of the scales... In case someone wants to see this unsightly sight I took few pics. Enjoy!

 

[Forsoothe!]

You may be the luckiest man in the world. You need to drive the wooden stake thru the heart of the beast with a systemic like Bayer 3-in-1 Rose to insure that you get any critters that escaped into someplace like a crack the bark, and keep on using it regularly. The second stage of home-hunting right after hatching for many scale (maybe all) on a crowded host is to grow tiny wings and let the wind currents take them to a new host. Think about that.

 

[mutsumi]

You may be the luckiest man in the world. You need to drive the wooden stake thru the heart of the beast with a systemic like Bayer 3-in-1 Rose to insure that you get any critters that escaped into someplace like a crack the bark, and keep on using it regularly. The second stage of home-hunting right after hatching for many scale (maybe all) on a crowded host is to grow tiny wings and let the wind currents take them to a new host. Think about that.

Thanks for the advice! I've never seen anything like this, will definitely have to treat and closely monitor and see what happens.

 

[HorseloverFat]

! I've never seen anything like this

Nor have I... happy skirmish, friend. I wish you luck.

I second throwing Rose Systemic at it... “nuke it”. (Stake the heart of the beast )

I’d “nuke” any plant near, to be safe...

They’re on your tables, tools, lights, clothes, too.. just remember that... treat accordingly.

 

[Cmd5235]

I’ve got a drop torch from my wildland fire days that will take care of that little insect issue...