Sooty mold blackens the leaf, decreases photosynthesis activity, decreases vigor and often causes disfigurement of the host. The soft brown scale is classified as a soft scale. These scales are protected by the chitinous body wall of the insect. Compared to the armored sales, they secrete very little wax. The body is usually smooth in outline, dome shaped, and brown, black or mottled in color.
Soft scales retain their legs and antennae throughout adult life.
Young females are primarily sedentary, but may move about for a brief time after feeding begins. Females are always wingless and males either have one pair of membranous wings or are wingless also. Although females develop eggs, they are retained within their bodies in a brood chamber. In warmer climates and in greenhouses there are continuous generations of this scale throughout the year. In temperate areas the scale overwinters out of doors as far north as the eastern seaboard of Virginia and southern Vancouver Island.