# Alberta dwarf spruce



## vince (Feb 24, 2006)

i don't know much about spruce but i know what they look like. So i am not familiar with diseases and what not. This little spruce which i keep in my sunroom looks unhealthy. on one side it is very green on the other it is turning red and it has some kind of material that looks like cotton or spider webs. I think it is too cold here for there to be spiders on it. can anyone tell me what that might be


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## TimberPig (Feb 26, 2006)

A picture would help, but it almost sounds like Cooley Spruce Gall Adelgid, if only the tips of the branches are going red. The spider web like material makes me think it isn't a foliar disease, but an insect attack.


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## Rtom45 (Feb 27, 2006)

Just off the top, sounds like spruce spider mite. If you could post a picture it might help.


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## Urban Forester (Mar 4, 2006)

it's mites, two-spotted or spruce. Wash down with water daily or take it outside and treat it with a registered MITE control, bifenizate or equivilent, NOT bifenthrin.


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## Thorinoak33 (Mar 31, 2006)

*Cooly spruce gull adelged for sure*

If there is a cottony substance then it is cooly spruce gull adelged. It is a soft bodied aphid like insect that eats on the new growth and forms a gull at the end of the new shoots that looks like a pine cone or something. It is very common in Spokane wa.We use merit and it smokes them right off. Dorm oil helps also if its not too hot.
It also could be mites but the cotton looking stuff is the give away, good luck!


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## treeseer (Mar 31, 2006)

if one side is bare it could be lack of sun too.


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## Tree Wizard (Mar 31, 2006)

Cooley Galls need the alternate host of Douglas Fir - unless you have one of them in your house its not Cooley Gall Aphids. I have never seen Cooley Galls on Alberta Spruce. The spider web stuff would indicate spider mites to me. In our area - Alberta spruce growing outside in a sunny location will dessicate quite readily in the winter.


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## Urban Forester (Apr 1, 2006)

Tree Wizard said:


> Cooley Galls need the alternate host of Douglas Fir - unless you have one of them in your house its not Cooley Gall Aphids. I have never seen Cooley Galls on Alberta Spruce.



I agree, considering that Alberta are grafted from White Spruce and Cooley adelgids attack the Colorado (Blue/Green) and Black spruce family, the only possible adelgid that it could be would be Eastern Spruce Gall Adelgid which go after Norways and Whites. However in 20 years I have never seen adelgids on Albertas either, but my experience is limited to Michigan. I still say it's mites, easy way to check would be to hold a white piece of paper under a branch or two and lightly shake the branch, they will fall on the paper and start running all over the place...good luck.


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## TimberPig (Apr 1, 2006)

Urban Forester said:


> I agree, considering that Alberta are grafted from White Spruce and Cooley adelgids attack the Colorado (Blue/Green) and Black spruce family, the only possible adelgid that it could be would be Eastern Spruce Gall Adelgid which go after Norways and Whites. However in 20 years I have never seen adelgids on Albertas either, but my experience is limited to Michigan. I still say it's mites, easy way to check would be to hold a white piece of paper under a branch or two and lightly shake the branch, they will fall on the paper and start running all over the place...good luck.



Cooley adelgids readily attack white and Engelmann spruce, not just black or Colorado spruce.


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