Mid-Coast IPM

It seems every day we get phone calls, texts, and emails showing us another county where the pasture mealybug can be found affecting the pastures and hayfields. The map below shows the latest information on the spread of the mealybug in Texas. If you have mealybugs in a county not shown in green, call, text or email me.  361-920-1138 or biles-sp@tamu.edu   Over the past few weeks, we have been conducting insecticide tests to determine what insecticides will be useful in managing the pasture mealybug populations. None of the insecticides we think will control the pasture mealybug are labeled for control of pasture mealybug in pastures in Texas. The only one labeled in pastures in Texas is Sefina, which is labeled for aphids in pastures. The insecticides were applied at 13 GPA using TT11002 flat fan nozzles. All applications included a non-ionic surfactant at 0.25% V/V. As of 14 days after treatment, we were not able to visually separate treatments and I expect it will take anot...

This past week we have seen corn leaves in several fields that have turned red. In the past few years, we have been concerned about the symptoms of corn stunt which is transmitted by the corn leafhopper. In the fields I looked in, the leaf reddening was caused by two things: pasture mealybug or poor pollination.  Some corn plants had yellowed or reddish leaves on the bottom of the plant. These plants were found only on the field edges up to 3-5 rows in, and bordered either the grassy roadside ditch or pastures. The grass in these pastures was infested with pasture mealybugs and the insects were moving into the corn fields.  Pasture mealybug damage to corn leaf So far, I have only found the damage to affect the plants on 4-5 rows into the field. I do not think this is economic damage; mostly because the leaf damage is below the ear leaf. Leaf damage cause by poor pollination In the other fields where I found leaf reddening, the red leaves were above the ear. Inspecting the ears...