Peanut planting is about to get real serious in Georgia, and we are once again monitoring tobacco thrips flight activity for the spring planting season. Producers who have already planted or who are planting this week should be watching peanut fields closely for thrips and signs of thrips injury as…
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By now most of you have probably heard that the US EPA recently announced that it would not proceed with any additional restrictions for chlorpyrifos or changes to US tolerances. This is good news for Georgia peanut producers who have very limited insecticide choices for several important pests.
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One of the last things a peanut grower wants to do is make an insecticide application in late September, and it is one of the last things that I want to recommend. We still have fields in Georgia with velvetbean caterpillar (VBC) infestations, and populations in some fields are high….
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Few pests of peanut are as dreaded or as difficult to control as the two spotted spider mite. Spider mites generally start to show up in peanut fields in late July, and if conditions are favorable they can severely injure or even kill plants. Hot and dry are the main…
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Drs. Monfort, Srinivasan, and I spent several days last week walking peanut fields to get a measure of how severe tomato spotted wilt is in this year’s crop. Incidence of virus symptoms varied from 0 to over 30% in the fields that were surveyed. This effort also gave me an…
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The first call I received about corn rootworm in peanut a couple weeks ago seemed like one of those interesting oddities that show up in a field or two every year but do not amount to much more than that. Since then I have gotten a couple more calls, and…
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There continue to be lesser cornstalk borers (LCB) in Georgia peanut fields, and I do not see any reason that should change over the next few weeks. Interestingly, most of the heavy pressure has not been in the Southwest but in the middle and eastern portions of South GA. I…
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I mentioned last week that we were getting some reports of lesser cornstalk borer (LCB) in peanut, and that hot, dry conditions could result in more pressure. Over the last three days I have received a number of calls and emails from agents, growers, and consultants indicating that LCB is…
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There has been no rain in Tift County this week, and as I walked my plots and a commercial field this morning I saw a few lesser cornstalk borer larvae in the sandy parts of non-irrigated fields. High temperatures combined with dry conditions favor three of the most troublesome arthropod…
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Thrips numbers on our traps have mostly been trending downward since 18 May. This pattern is typical of what we have seen in Georgia over the last few years. Many if not most of our peanut acres are getting to the point at which thrips injury is no longer a…
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