I wish that this stuff looked familiar to me, but it doesn't. I'm disappointed that your extension office can't be of more help than to you.

Maybe you should call them back and ask if there is not someone who can look at some good emailed images. OR, you can contact the entomology extension specialists with that same question...."Can you look at some images if I send them to you?"

Almost look like conidia from here, but hard to do distance diagnoses sometimes.

Dan

Thanks.

Rhizo, I'm trying the extension office, but it takes a couple of weeks for them to test it. I'm nervous of losing the 2nd one in that time, but not much I can do. I don't want to just spray them with random stuff in the meantime and risk more damage.

Your Extension Office needs weeks to get an agent to look at a photo?!?!??!?

Dan

Dan,

No, to actually test a sample of the plant.

How sad the Extension office doesn't have the capacity/resources to solve this. I'm on a pest listserv in my area and we get Agent requests all the time, with much better reso pix. But some of those structures sure look like conidia from here.

Dan

If the Extension has Master Gardeners -- most do -- you can walk the sample in or even email good quality images. The MGs will confer with an agent in short order.

That said, I doubt it's a disease.

More often then not the Horticulture agent at the local extension service office will send the sample to an expert at the state university for a look and diagnosis. Master Gardeners might, sometimes, be able to tell what the problem is but many things can be outside their expeerience and knowledge, just as it is with ours here.
What are the soil conditions these "Ilex" are growing in?
What is the soil like?

My wife was an Extension specialist. I doubt she had more than two-three instances that took weeks. If there's not someone around who knows, they are not at capacity. GA has good Extension.

Dan

The soil is well drained below these bushes. It's your typical Georgia red clay with a layer of top soil up top. The roots are pretty strong, even on the dead one.

As for the extension office, part of the issue is just my schedule as I work long hours. Anyways, one of the master gardeners is looking at the photos now and if they can't figure it out I'll drop it off.

As a former grower of many holly varieties I have a few questions.
1. Based on the visual appearance and shorter height of the two dying hollies...is there a dog on the property?
2. Crawl under both dying bushes and search around the trunks at the soil line looking for rabbit damage and chewing around the trunk. Quite common for rabbits to nest beneath dense hollies causing enough bark damage to kill them.
3. Your 3rd picture shows a fungal(?) form which is purple in color yet described as brown. Would another photograph help us? Please get some samples off for testing PDQ although I suspect this is a cultural problem and not a fungus. Whatever, we need to know.

Well, I still haven't been able to get any response from my local extension office. I'll try another one here.

In the meantime, the holly that was yellow is now totally dead.

And the brown granular substance I noted is beginning to appear on the third holly.

There also appears to be some tiny spider webs and a cocoon like item. Here's a couple pictures of the cocoon hanging between the now dead holly and the still-healthy one.

I know those aren't great pictures, but has anyone seen anything like these? Is there some general pesticide that I could buy to try that wouldn't cause additional harm?

Nandina, to answer your questions:
1) I have a dog, but she rarely goes into the front yard where these hollies are. I doubt these hollies ever see a dog more than occasionally, as my yard is up a steep hill at the top of a wall, so pedestrian dog walkers's dogs can't get to them.
2) I don't see any signs of rabbits or any kind of teeth marks on the trunks.
3) What's a PDQ? The substance did look purplish in the picture, but it is actually brown and then turns blackish once the plant dies.

I think I may have figured out what it is: wax scales.

I just noticed that on the very bottom stems of the third holly there is this white playdoughy substance. The description of the symptoms of wax scales sounds like what I've seen: yellowing with early falling off of leaves. I also just noticed that ants are all over the third still alive holly at the bottom, and supposedly the residue wax scales leaves behind attracts ants.

I might pick up some Carbaryl and see if that saves the third holly...

We haven't seen a picture of wax scales. The primary symptom of those insects is the scale itself, which can't be missed. See attached link for an image.

PDQ= pretty damn quick

HI, Nandina!

Here is a link that might be useful:

It doesn't look as "detailed" as images of wax scales available online; it's just white globs.

Looks like wax scale to me! Carbaryl would not be a successful pesticide to use for scale insects.

Let me start with a "hello" back to rhizo 1. A real pro!

Looks like wax scale to me although the amount needed to kill your hollies should have been very noticeable early on and this may be a secondary infection. The chemical we used to use for wax scale has been removed from the market. I did some searching and still am not sure what is being used now as a control. If they were my hollies I would purchase the concentrated form of Ortho Systemic Insect Spray, mix it in a watering can according to package instructions and slowly pour a watering can full over each holly covering trunk/branches and allowing it to soak into the ground around each shrub once a month. Wax scale is a bear to treat and I always prefer to treat it systemically. Grill your extension service for additional treatment methods. Would you please update us on any information provided by the extension service as this is an interesting situation.

Thanks for the follow ups.

I will try the Ortho Systemic Insect spray you recommended, Nandina.

It is strange I didn't notice wax scales on the 1st two (now-dead) hollies. That said, do the white scales fall off/disappear after enough time? I didn't notice any problems with the 1st two hollies until way too late; they were both brown and dead when I saw them. Whereas with this third holly it's still green all over and just now showing some of this weird substance only on the portion that touches the adjacent dead holly. Just wondering if these white scales disappear once the plant is near death...

A number of sites I've found say carbaryl (Sevin) is good for treating scale; is that wrong?

I don't use any oils or pesticides for insect control as I grow organically. google Arbico. they specialize in beneficial insects. I ordered three praying manti egg cases. one for my yard and for my neighbors on both sides. one egg case hatches abou two hundred manti. They devour every insect you hate. and once they live out their life cycle they lay their own egg cases. so now I have an ongoing population of manti. I live an hour north of death Valley so its a desrt hot blazing summers freezing winters if my manti can stay alive year after year your area will support them as well. also consider Ladybugs these are literalyy the toughest bug in the pack they eat every single pest bug you can imagine problem is when they eat everything they move on to find more food. I even take my baby manti indoors to work over my bonsai and houseplants I leave a couple of windows open all the time for my cats to get in and out. so manti have an escape, or entrance if they choose. I grow vegetables, tobacco, fruit, housplants and bonsai. this was a permanent and inexpensive solution to my bug problem. Good Luck!!!!

Nobody commented on the long treads with pearl-like things on them. My Burford hollies get them every year and I have long tried to find out what they are. The hollies show no damage, so I thought they are just hangin' around.