The adult psyllid is difficult to see with the naked eye and is about 2 mm long and yellow in colour. Eggs are laid between new leaves on young shoot tips. It takes 10-20 days to go from egg to adult stage. The insect is common on the young growth leucaena trees where the eggs, wingless nymphs and winged adults often occur together.

      Because of the difficulty of detecting this insect with the naked eye, its presence may not be noticed until damage is evident. Adults and nymphs inflict injury to leucaena plants by de-sapping young shoots, leaves and flowering structures. This can cause wilting of foliage, especially the new shoots and, complete efoliation of susceptible leucaena varieties. In severe cases, plants die.

      Menochilus sexmaculatus, a coccinellid predator is found to be effective on Leucaena psyllid, Heteropsylla cubana