no leaves on my gooseberries

[carole]

I have 2 large gooseberry bushes. One invicta (usually produces 7lb of fruit a year) and a smaller newer one (leveller). This year they didn't come in to leaf. One bush managed to produce some tiny leaves on a few branches, but for all intents and purposes I may as well say there are none.

Any ideas what caused this. The other soft fruit in my fruit cage are cropping heavily this year.

Carole

[glallotments]

It could be gooseberry sawfly - see RS article http://www.rhs.org.uk/Advice/profiles0601/gooseberry_sawfly.asp
Does it look as though leaves have been eaten or just not grown?

[carole]

I've had sawfly in the past , but the leaves that have come through just look like forming leaves and are just breaking out of the bud. howeevr they haven't got any bigger, like they are stuck in the bud. i would say that I've only got about 15 of these tiny leaves on a large bush.

[richard p]

doesnt sound like sawfly to me, normally the leaves form ok and are thn eaten off by the caterpillars in early summer,