It looks like insect damage to me. Sometimes the leaves of the dogwoods are like that and also the virginia creeper can get like that.

Aphids? Thrips?

Anyone else have any ideas?

Brenda

I was thinking the same as Brenda. Aphids or Thrips.

Sierra

My chokecherry trees used to look similar at times. There was also nodules on the leaves. It was some sort of mite.

Shelley

So I googled what both the thrip and aphid damage would look like, and I think it is thrips. Last year I had a ton of aphids, but I think they came after I noticed this on the plant last year.

If it is thrips, do I try to use a soap or pesticide on it? I need to find a way to control this for next year, because I can't stand to look at how deformed the plant is, keeping in mind that the plant wasn't my first choice for the area to begin with! I quite like the plant when it is healthy looking and blooming, but since this particular one had only 2 blooms this year anyways, if I can't get it healthy enough to set new flower buds, it will be ripped out. I see no point to a lilac plant that won't flower properly.

I did read that thrips generally target one plant in a garden at one time, so I would prefer them to stay on the lilac to be controlled, rather than spreading to my roses!

Janet

Hi Janet--
Just my two cents. I had similar damage on my viburnum. I wasn't sure what it was until this year--aphids.

Before this year I had tried insecticide soap and dormant oil this spring. The dormant oil worked somewhat--minimized the damaged in early spring, but the buggers kept their stronghold and escalated. I ended up treated the tree with Bayer Advanced tree and shrub. Its done the trick.

I am not much for using non-eco friendly insecticides, but with the leaves being curled over the critters spraying the tree doesn't work very well. Bayer is suppose to work well on thrips as well as aphids. Good Luck--Carolyn