Is my Californian Lilac ok?

I have attached two photos. I bought it last summer and it had beautiful flowers. Later in the summer I noticed that there were many cobwebs on it and spiders were nesting in them. There were also black dots and the leafs turned dark-red/brown. The spiders weren't like mites, they were small back spiders.
The Lilac has survived the winter well and I am hoping for new flowers later on, but the stem is pretty mucky greenish and those black dots are still there.
I am a little confused, as I don't know whether this is normal for this kind of plant and I also don't want those spiders to come back.
When I got the plant, all the leafs were green and there was no brown on them.
Thank you for your help in advance!

 

Black dots are maybe aphids? You've got some curling happening on your leaves, which isn't a good sign. I'd hose them down with Safer's Insecticidal Soap to be on the safe side (no pun intended) - if those are aphids it will kill them without harming your tree or putting a lot of icky chemicals into your yard. It should also do away with the spiders.

 

Thanks for the advice :) I have tried to clean it with normal soap water, but it didn't work, so I will try what you suggested.
Do you think the curling of the leafs is related to the spiders? I have checked for aphids, but there were none, only the spiders.

 

Then yes, it's the spiders. I've never actually had a problem like this with spiders proper, only spider-mites. Very strange. At any rate, the Safer's will kill it.

 

I've fought with a ceanothus for years in a similar climate to yours. It seems unhappy in our cool wet winter climate, and also can get burnt by cold dry winds. On the other hand it does well with our temperate low humidity summers.

Good drainage seems critical, and be sure you haven't planted the root ball low.

Leaf spots are almost a given with our winter wet...have to live with some of those. The spiders will be something to protect, as the common pest of mine was the lace bug, which the spiders would help to control. Most sprays will just knock back predators of the lace bugs, and also encourage mites which need the balancing of predators or you will be spraying regularly til kingdom come :-)

My advice would be to concentrate on giving it the best situation possible, careful watering in dry summer stretches, good sun and excellent drainage. I have not found this to be a super easy plant to keep "looking good"...and plants from nurseries are often quite perfect looking, having very coarse potting mixes and near optimal fertilization. Keeping them that way in our gardens is difficult!

 

Mine are flawless and I never water or feed them. An explosion of flowers every spring and a smaller second flush in the fall. A fast grower too!

Cheers, LPN.

 

Looks like it might have mites, otherwise maybe too wet or actually needs fertilizer. Should be much greener. Even garden-tolerant forms dominating nursery offerings can only take so much departing from the Mediterranean type climate and soil conditions of their wild progenitors before distress becomes evident.