It has been a relative quiet spring for insect questions in tobacco, but last week I received several calls asking about aphid management in tobacco greenhouses. Aphids are an occasional pest in tobacco greenhouses, and the last time I had … Continue reading
This winter, I will be sharing results from several projects designed to assess the activity and utility of the recently registered tobacco insecticides, cholorantraniliprole (Coragen®) and flubendianmide (Belt®). We have been working with both these products since 2008 in order … Continue reading
One of the first projects my lab tackled when I began working in North Carolina was attempting to understanding the biology and behavior of tobacco splitworm. Our goal was to use this information to develop more effective scouting and management … Continue reading
This Wednesday, David Tarpy & Jen Keller of the NC State University Apiculture Program and I began an exploratory project to determine if honey bees will make honey from flowering tobacco, and if so, what the properties of that honey are. … Continue reading
Organic Field Crops Tour I will be part of the Organic Field Crops Tour on the evening of July 19th, at Hickory Meadows Organics near Whitakers, NC, discussing some of our recent work on integrated pest management in organic tobacco. … Continue reading
This time of year I get a lot of questions about “difficult to control” tobacco budworms. My first question is always: How close to topping is the grower? If plants are flowering, there is absolutely no need to treat tobacco … Continue reading
Green peach aphids (Myzus persicae) are one of the most common insect pests of tobacco. Contrary to their name, not all green peach aphids are green. In fact, like many other aphid species including potato aphids and pea aphids, green … Continue reading
Recently, I received two calls about tobacco flea beetle feeding and live beetles in tobacco that had been treated in the greenhouse with systemic insecticides (both were imidacloprid products). Reducing early season flea beetle feeding is one of the three … Continue reading
I have received several calls from county agents in the last three weeks about stunted tobacco plants with a range of symptoms, each wondering about the possible role of systemic insecticides in the symptoms being observed. While there are more … Continue reading
While rating our experiments last week at the Lower Coastal Plain Research Station near Kinston, NC, we noticed a few tobacco or tomato hornworm eggs scattered among our plots. We weren’t the only ones–other tobacco research plots at the station … Continue reading