I just potted an owari satsuma standard last week and when watering today I noticed a few areas on the bark that looked like tiny little mollusks. When I flicked them off the bark, bazillions of tiny little white critters crawled out of it.
AND, all around the tree, if you look really closely, there are the same dust-sized little white things crawling around and they're moving FAST.
I'm fairly new to citrus, and when I first bought this tree a few weeks ago, there was something on a leaf that I now realize was probably a cottony cushion scale, but the nursery scraped it off told me it was harmless and I bought it any way. Like I said, I didn't know any better then.
I called the nursery manager and he told me he would take back the tree if I wanted, but he also said that scale is pretty common and easy to treat.
Is that true? Is it easy to get rid of? Organically? Are horticultural oils and insecticidal soaps A) Effective and B) organic? (My hope is no chemicals.)
Right now, there are only a few of these things... but will it harm the tree or spread to my other potted citrus?
I suppose I do have a way out... and just take it back. But it's a lovely Four Winds standard that has already been pruned to a round ball, with the main leader cut at about eye level. It was the only one like it, and I bought it because I wanted to add some variety of height in my patio pot landscaping... and I would hate to give up and take it back if this is something easy to fix.
Then again, if someone were to tell me that scale was like the black plague of citrus, it goes back, today. LOL
So what would you do?
1) Take it back?
OR,
2) Keep it and treat it?
THANKS for your input!
