Insect Pest - Beetles

Fruit and Vegetable News, Volume 13, Issue 1 (April, 2022). Topic in this issue are: Check for Allium leaf miner in onions and leeks over the next few weeks, Edema problem in high tunnel tomatoes, Using Plant Growth Regulators to Improve Apple Return Bloom, Botryis Fruit Rot (Gray Mold) and Crown Rot in Strawberries, Spring Pest Scouting in Strawberries, and Early Spring Vegetable Insect Scouting Tips.

I visited a few tomato fields this week and found 2-4-week-old tomato plants with some early blight (Alternaria solani) and in some cases bad early blight lesions. This is very early in the season to be seeing this level of early blight. Many of the plants had a few flea beetle adults on the plant (fig 1) and in the areas where the early blight was found also had moderate to high flea beetle feeding (fig 2).

Striped cucumber beetles (Acalymma vittatum) (SCB) are the most important insect pests of muskmelon and cucumbers in our area. They overwinter as adults and emerge when temperatures reach 54–62°F at which time they begin searching for cucurbit hosts. Volatiles produced by the plant attracts SCB to cucurbits initially, then male SCBs produce an aggregation pheromone attracting more beetles. The beetles tend to mass on small plants where they eat, mate and defecate (fig 1).