I'm a Sugar Maple and These Are My Pests

This Sugar Maple, infested with spindle-shaped leaf galls, was beginning to show fall color.

 

The "Maple Spindle Gall" condition is due to an army of mites (Vasates aceriscrumena) that have set up housekeeping on the upper surface of the leaves. Each gall, produced by the leaf in response to the feeding mite, contains one female mite that feeds on the leaf and lays eggs within the gall. Though the galls are very unsightly, the mites do not usually kill the host plant.

Done