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My apple tree sapling has been infested by some kind of caterpillar. What can I do to get rid of them, and eventually prevent them from coming back?

They have appeared over the course of one week, and only the apple tree is affected.

The caterpillar are eating the leaves, they have orange/tan body and small black head.

caterpillars eating the leaves

Location: Central Europe Time: early June

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Some form of tent caterpillar. At this small scale you can just take a bucket of hot soapy water, rip the web open and drop the caterpillars in the hot soapy water to expire. Gloves may be advisable - some caterpillars have irritating hairs. You can lay newspaper on the ground before starting to help prevent any that drop to the ground from getting away.

You can also rip the web open and treat with Bt - or just treat with Bt - Bt is of more benefit when the scale of the tree and infestation is larger than this. Direct intervention can solve this scale of infestation quickly, unless it's on hundreds of trees.

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  • Thanks. For context Bt is "The bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis Berliner (Bt) is the active ingredient in a number of microbial Insecticides registered for home use on vegetables, trees, ornamentals and flowers for the control of certain caterpillars."
    – jnovacho
    Commented Jun 12 at 18:15

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