Just a reminder to all fruit producers to organize and prep your fruit insect monitoring tools for the upcoming season! Depending on your fruit crop and location in the state, there’s a suite of fruit insects that are important for you to track, including moths, aphids, scales, stink bugs, fruit and vinegar flies, and[Read More…]
Elizabeth Yim Long
We were all hoping it would happen later, but unfortunately the spotted lanternfly (SLF) (Lycorma delicatula) (Figure 1), an invasive planthopper with a piercing-sucking feeding strategy, was officially detected in Vevay, Indiana (Switzerland County) for the first time in July 2021. You can see pictures and read more about the detection at the Indiana Department[Read More…]
Updates on Spotted-wing Drosophila (SWD) activity in Indiana blueberries Zihan (Lilac) Hong and Elizabeth Y. Long, Purdue Entomology Summer is a time we always look forward to delicious fresh fruit! According to the 2017 USDA Census of Agriculture, 150+ farms grow some 600 acres of blueberries in Indiana! Some common varieties include Bluecrop, Bluejay, Blueray,[Read More…]
I am a bit late on the topic of bees for fruit pollination, especially tree fruit, but I wonder how many readers use or maintain spring mason bees for pollination of tree fruits? If not for pollination, then perhaps just for fun? (Figure 1). If not, you might consider this for next season! Those who[Read More…]
A natural wonder will occur in 15 states this year: the emergence of the Brood X, 17-year periodical cicadas! Also known as “17-year or 13-year locusts” the last mass emergence of these insects occurred in 2004. Now, 17 years later, the immature cicadas will emerge from the ground, molt one last time to gain wings,[Read More…]
If you have small fruits, including cherries, blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, and grapes that are setting fruit and ripening, be on the look out for Spotted Wing Drosophila (SWD) (Figure 1), a small vinegar fly that attacks all the delicious berries mentioned above! If you are a small fruit grower, you’ve likely already heard of SWD,[Read More…]
The horticultural entomology team is happy to report that we’re continuing efforts to support Indiana apple growers by monitoring tree fruit pests and reporting what we find! On April 22, 2020, we placed pheromone-baited monitoring traps for two important tree fruit pests, the codling moth and Oriental fruit moth at the Meigs Purdue Agricultural Center[Read More…]