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Forages & Grains
Volume 61 Number 13 Date 07/28/2016


POTATO LEAFHOPPER - Surveys continue to yield below-threshold counts of less than two leafhoppers per sweep, despite favorably hot temperatures of late July. Nevertheless, weekly monitoring of third- and fourth-crop alfalfa throughout August is recommended.

PLANT BUG - Counts are similar to last week at 0.1-1.3 adults and nymphs per sweep. Most fields contain 0.5 plant bugs or fewer per sweep, a fraction of the economic threshold of five per sweep. Nymphs have become more abundant in alfalfa in the last two weeks and now comprise about 50-75% of the plant bugs in sweep net collections.

PEA APHID - Levels are still low at less than two aphids per sweep in most alfalfa fields sampled in southern and western Wisconsin. Average counts in the eastern counties of Brown, Marinette, Oconto, Outagamie and Winnebago are slightly higher at 2-7 per sweep.

BLACK BLISTER BEETLE - A few alfalfa fields surveyed in Fond du Lac, Jackson, Monroe and Trempealeau counties contained low counts of 1-2 beetles per 100 sweeps. Blister beetles can be an indicator of potentially high grasshopper populations since the immature stages are predaceous upon grasshopper eggs. Survey observations suggest that grasshoppers have increased sharply in the margins of many alfalfa, corn and soybean fields.

-- Krista Hamilton, DATCP Entomologist