page_title: Diplolepis rosae
section_title: Infestations
hierarchical_section_title: Diplolepis rosae / Infestations
context_page_description: Diplolepis rosae is a gall wasp which causes a gall known as the rose bedeguar gall, Robin's pincushion, mossy rose gall, or simply moss gall. The gall develops as a chemically induced distortion of an unopened leaf axillary or terminal bud, mostly on field rose or dog rose shrubs. The female lays up to 60 eggs within each leaf bud using her ovipositor. The grubs develop within the gall, and the wasps emerge in spring; the wasp is parthenogenetic with fewer than one percent being males. Previous synonyms for the species are Diplolepis bedeguaris, Rhodites rosae, and Cynips rosae.
  A similar gall is caused by Diplolepis mayri, but this is much less common.
context_section_description: The galls occur more commonly on plants under stress, i.e. very dry conditions, waterlogging or hedge cutting, whereas vigorously growing plants are less commonly found to have galls. Whether the vigorous plant suppresses gall formation or is avoided by the wasp in favour of easier targets is unknown. Young and damaged plants tend to produce larger and more numerous galls than old and intact ones. In the latter, many eggs are laid, but the number of galls formed is relatively few.
  The relative number of parasitoids decreases with increasing gall volume. And the closer the gall is to the ground, the greater the total number of adults that emerge. Thus, it seems more effective for a female D. rosae to induce larger galls on lower branches of the shrubs to increase the survival probability of the offspring. The distances from margins of shrubs, however, affects neither the parasitoid ratio of galls nor the volume of the galls.
  Removing and destroying galls before they dry and the wasps emerge may help to reduce the infestation. While fairly large, and sometimes present in quite large numbers on scrub specimens, they cause no measurable harm.
caption: Rose bedeguar galls and rose hips in autumn
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