How do we control bagworms on our HOA's junipers and evergreens?

By OurHOA · General information · Revised October 30, 2026

How an HOA board controls bagworms on junipers and evergreens: winter hand picking, spray timing on young larvae, licensing, contract wording and a sample year.

Part of the HOA board handbook: vendors, projects and upkeep.

The short answer

The brown, cone-shaped bags hanging from your junipers, arborvitae or cedars are bagworms. Each bag holds a caterpillar, and in winter each female bag holds hundreds of eggs. Left alone they strip evergreens, and evergreens do not grow back the needles they lose, so several heavy years in a row can kill a mature shrub. The cheapest fix is a winter work day: cut the bags off and destroy them before the eggs hatch. Where the shrubs are too tall or there are too many of them, have a licensed applicator spray a caterpillar product in late spring while the larvae are tiny, and repeat it through the hatch. By late summer the bags are an inch or longer and sealed, and spraying then mostly wastes money. Your governing documents decide which shrubs the association maintains, and state law decides who may apply pesticides. Treat this guide as general education, not legal advice.

How to tell it is bagworms

The bag is silk covered in bits of whatever plant the caterpillar is eating, so on a juniper it looks like part of the juniper. Kansas State University's Extension fact sheet notes that people mistake the bags for pine cones, and that bags also turn up on buildings, trash containers and decks. Texas A&M AgriLife's fact sheet gives the size at maturity: bags 1-3/4 to 2 inches long and more than half an inch wide. Evergreens are the main targets. Texas A&M lists arborvitae, cedars, cypress, junipers, pines and spruce, plus broadleaf plants such as Indian hawthorn, elm, maple, oaks, sycamore and willow. In Florida, UF/IFAS Extension in Escambia County lists cedar, cypress, live oak, pine and Indian hawthorn, and treats bagworms as a pest once they cover more than 10 percent of a plant. Two details help on a walk-through. K-State says female bags sit mostly near the tops of trees and shrubs and male bags near the bottom, so look up, not just at eye level. And NC State Extension warns that the silk band holding each bag can girdle the twig, which dies and breaks off at that point, so brown tips can show up even on shrubs with few bags left.

The life cycle sets your calendar

The common evergreen bagworm has one generation a year. Texas A&M says it lives in east-central Texas from the Oklahoma line to the Gulf Coast. Eggs spend the winter inside the dead female's bag. Texas A&M puts the count at 400 to 1,000 eggs per female, and K-State points out that one missed female bag can mean 500 to 1,000 caterpillars the next season. The eggs hatch in late spring. K-State gives mid-May through early June for Kansas and says cool weather pushes it later; NC State says May and June. Larvae that are 1/8 to 1/4 inch long spin a silk thread and ride the wind to nearby plants, which is how one infested juniper turns into an infested hedge. They feed for about three months, and from mid-August to early September, K-State says, they seal their bags and stop feeding. Texas has other species with other calendars. Texas A&M describes the live oak bagworm along the Gulf Coast to the Louisiana line, whose eggs may hatch as early as February, and a desert bagworm from El Paso to Alpine that spends the winter as large larvae. If you are in South Texas, the Trans-Pecos or Colorado, ask your county Extension office to identify a sample bag and tell you when the local hatch happens before you schedule anything.

Winter hand picking, done right

Texas A&M calls hand picking the cheapest control, best done in winter when the bags are easy to see and the eggs are still inside. It is a good volunteer job on shrubs you can reach from the ground. How to do it: - Cut the silk band with pruners or a knife instead of yanking the bag. NC State notes that pulling can strip needles, and a band left on the twig can still girdle it. - Drop each bag into a bucket of soapy water, about 1 fluid ounce of dish soap per gallon, and let it soak for 15 minutes. That is K-State's method. Then dump the bags in a pile in full sun. - Never toss bags on the ground. Texas A&M says eggs in discarded bags still hatch in spring and reinfest the plants. K-State also says to keep them out of trash containers and compost piles. - Check nearby building walls, decks and trash enclosures, where bags also hang. - Mark the worst plants on a common area map so the spring crew knows where to look first. Keep volunteers on the ground or a short step stool. Anything that needs a tall ladder goes to the contractor. Notice wording to adapt: 'Bagworm work day, Saturday [date], 9 to 11 a.m., meet at [location]. We will cut bagworm bags off the junipers along [street] before the eggs hatch in spring. Bring hand pruners and gloves. Buckets and soap provided. Please do not drop bags on the ground; each one can hold hundreds of eggs.'

Spraying: timing matters more than the product

Spray when the larvae are small. K-State says to treat when they are 1/8 to 1/4 inch long. Because eggs do not all hatch at once, its fact sheet calls for applications once a week for four weeks starting in late May, in the morning or evening when larvae feed. Texas A&M says products applied in April, May and June work in most of Texas, and gives a way to time it: collect a few bags in late winter, keep them in a container out of the sun, and spray once caterpillars start crawling out. Bacillus thuringiensis kurstaki (Bt) and spinosad both work on young bagworms. K-State notes that both are stomach poisons, so the caterpillar has to eat treated foliage. NC State adds that the bag is waterproof, so a spray that only kills on contact may miss. That makes coverage the real test: every branch, including the inner and upper parts of tall shrubs. For rows of tall eastern red cedar, K-State says a high-pressure sprayer may be needed. Once larvae reach 1 to 2 inches, they are much harder to kill. If the contractor proposes a pyrethroid such as bifenthrin or permethrin, ask where it will be used. NC State warns that pyrethroids are highly toxic to fish, so keep them away from the pond, the pool and any creek. Whatever the product, ask to see a label that lists bagworms and the plants being treated.

Who may apply it in Texas, Florida and Colorado

Texas. Tex. Occ. Code 1951.003 counts identifying or treating pests of trees, shrubs or other plantings in a park or next to a residence, for pay, as structural pest control. Section 1951.301 bars anyone from that business without a license from the Texas Department of Agriculture. A mowing crew without one should not be spraying your hedges. Florida. Fla. Stat. 482.156 lets landscape maintenance workers with a limited certification treat ornamental plants only with products whose label carries no signal word or the word 'caution', and only with handheld equipment or backpack sprayers, not power equipment. A high-pressure rig on tall junipers falls outside that certification. Colorado. C.R.S. 35-10-103 defines a commercial applicator as anyone in the business of applying pesticides for hire, and section 35-10-105 requires a commercial applicator business license from the Commissioner of Agriculture. In every state, write the license number into the contract and the board minutes. Volunteers cutting off bags by hand need no license.

Contract wording, a motion and a sample year

Add this to the landscape contract: 'Contractor shall inspect all association junipers, arborvitae and other listed evergreens for bagworms each [February] and report infested plants by map number. Between [May 15] and [June 30], contractor shall apply a product labeled for bagworms on ornamentals to the listed plants, repeating at the label interval until hatch ends, and shall provide the date, product, active ingredient and applicator license number for each application. No pyrethroid products within [50] feet of the pond or pool. Price per application by plant group: [ ].' Our guide on how to hire an HOA landscaping contractor covers bid sheets and certificates of insurance. Sample motion: 'Move that the association hire [company], license [number], to treat bagworms on the evergreens shown on the attached map from [date] to [date], at a cost not to exceed $[amount] from the landscaping budget.' A sample year: - December to March: walk-through, map hot spots, volunteer work day, collect a few bags for a hatch check. - April to May: watch the saved bags; South Texas and Gulf Coast boards check with Extension sooner. - Late May to June: weekly treatments while larvae are small. - July: spot check; hand pick stragglers on small shrubs. - August to September: bags are sealed, so skip spraying and update the map. - October to November: price next year's work and decide which dead shrubs to replace.

Mistakes that let bagworms come back

Spraying in August because that is when the bags are obvious. By then K-State says the larvae have stopped feeding and sealed up. Paying for one spray in late spring and calling it done. The hatch runs for weeks, and caterpillars ballooning in from a neighbor's yard start the problem over. Picking bags and leaving them in the mulch, where the eggs hatch right under the shrub. Waiting for birds to fix it. K-State says birds and parasitic wasps do not kill enough bagworms to prevent damage. Replanting the same junipers shoulder to shoulder. K-State notes that larvae crawl between plants whose foliage touches, so leave space between new plants. Our guide on how to plan an HOA tree maintenance program shows where shrub and tree replacement fits in the yearly budget. Letting an unlicensed crew apply products. Check the license number before the first application, not after a complaint.

Sources

These guides are general education for HOA boards and residents, not legal, tax, or financial advice. Rules vary by state and by your community's governing documents - check with a professional for your situation.

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