Strawberries are beginning to ripen in south Georgia and blooming across the state. Early scouting for spider mites is extremely important if you want to have a successful season. Now is a good time to be tissue sampling for fertilizer applications as well. You can easily check those leaves for mites before sending them to the lab for analysis.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
The two-spotted spider mite are very tiny (0.4 mm) and usually light yellow with a distinct spot on either side of the abdomen.\u00a0 The spider mites have piercing-sucking mouthparts that cause damage as they feed on the plant cells.\u00a0 This feeding usually occurs on the underside of the leaf making early detection more difficult.\u00a0 When populations are high you may also be able to find small clear spherical eggs on the underside of the leaves<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Low levels of infestation and feeding cause a slight stippled look to the upper leaf surface. As infestations grow the leaves become brittle with a bronze tint to them. Leaves can appear \u201cdirty\u2019 and may be covered with webbing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Early detection is important since research has proven that even low numbers of mites can reduce yields.\u00a0 Strawberries can tolerate higher numbers of spider mites as the season progresses.\u00a0\u00a0 At this time of the season the threshold for strawberries is 5 per leaflet. As the season progresses the threshold moves up to 20 per leaflet. Treating an infestation too late may control the pest but will probably have little impact on yield.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
There are several miticides on the market that work well on two-spotted spider mites.\u00a0 It is important to understand that some miticides are only effective on certain life stages.\u00a0 Using a product that is effective on eggs and juveniles will do no good if only adults are present.\u00a0 Growers should also check with their plant supplier to determine if miticides were applied in the nursery.\u00a0 If multiple applications of miticides are needed it is a good practice to rotate products with differing modes of action (MOA).\u00a0 Also unnecsessary applications of insecticides will almost always flare mite problems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Since mites feed on the underside of the leaf, thorough coverage is critical.\u00a0 Application rates of 50 and 100 gallons of water per acre are not uncommon for controlling mites.\u00a0 There are some organically approved miticides and predatory mites have also proven effective.\u00a0 if you need assistance or recommendations contact your County Agent<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Strawberries are beginning to ripen in south Georgia and blooming across the state. Early scouting for spider mites is extremely important if you want to have a successful season. Now is a good time to be tissue sampling for fertilizer applications as well. You can easily check those leaves for mites before sending them to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":122,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-318","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/122"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=318"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":321,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/318\/revisions\/321"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=318"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=318"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/strawberry\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=318"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}