Good Fruit Grower

April 1

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Stinkbug WATCH The brown marmorated stinkbug has been snapped on cell phone cameras and the locations mapped. by Richard Lehnert E ntomologists in New York State developed a clever way of keep- ing an eye out for inroads by the brown marmorated stinkbug. It's been found across the state. So far, however, numbers have stayed small, and, as far as is known, no fruit growers have needed to spray to suppress it. "We have not seen populations that would warrant control measures so far," Peter Jentsch, an extension entomologist at the Hudson Valley Laboratory in High- land, New York, told growers late in last fall's harvest season. After fruit growers in the Mid-Atlantic states just south of New York saw exten- sive damage in 2010, Jentsch and Mike Fargione, his Hudson Valley Lab col- league, developed a cooperative program with Cornell University's Master Gardener Program. The idea was to enlist the aid of homeowners to watch for the stinkbugs and then report their finds. This statewide monitoring program was launched in the fall of 2010 and the winter following. Articles in newspapers focused on this "most wanted" stinkbug, and information began to appear on Facebook and other social media. People who found what they thought was a brown marmorated stinkbug filled out a form with details of the finding and mailed it, along with the bug, to the Hudson Valley Laboratory. "For the survey thus far, we've received over 500 insect specimens from 235 loca- tions in 35 counties throughout the state," Jentsch said in a presentation during the Empire State Fruit and Vegetable Expo in January. Starting last fall, the researchers added a new twist. The public was asked to sub- mit digital images using phones equipped with cameras and GPS capability, so the exact latitude and longitude of the finding was recorded, along with a picture of the bug. That effort generated 126 responses, and 71 percent of the bugs were confirmed as brown marmorated stinkbug, Jentsch said. The data was used to create a map showing the distribution of the bug in New York State. That map is online at http://hudsonvfr.cce.cornell.edu/bmsb1 .html. The map shows the stinkbug is on Long Island, in the Hudson River Valley from New York City to midstate, in the grape growing area around the Finger Lakes, in the apple-growing area along www.goodfruit.com Lake Ontario, and in the stone fruit region near Lake Erie. "The highest concentrations of BMSB on commodity have been observed on green and red bell pepper in Marlboro, New York," Jentsch said. "Although a small number of BMSB have been observed on ag commodities, to date we have only observed a single monitoring site of BMSB field populations of an agricultural Orchard-Rite® commodity that would warrant pest man- agement control measures, in organic pepper, Marlboro, New York," he said. Marlboro is in the Hudson River Valley north of New York City. When spring comes, Cornell researchers and extension staff plan addi- tional monitoring of the insect using a more attractive pheromone blend, Jentsch said. "Efforts to track the movement of the BMSB from the urban environment into the landscape will include monitoring of nonagricultural host plants that border the farm landscape." These include maple and ash trees and an invasive tree from Asia called Tree of Heaven (Ailanthus altissima)."We intend to make every effort to alert producers in the state of the pres- ence of this pest in agricultural crops," Jentsch said. • Wind Machines • www.orchard-rite.com "Orchard Rite Service is second to none." "We're real believers in the Auto Start option." acreage in apples and pears. From November to February, we can deal with arctic events that will take our temperature into the single digits—and even subzero. A I really don't think it's possible to grow stone fruit economically in the Yakima Valley without wind machines. This last year, we would not have even had an apricot crop without them. All of our wind machine purchases since 1982 have been Orchard-Rite. In the wintertime, when we're starting these machines, the temperatures are usually single digits to subzero. We depend on—and have complete confidence in—our Orchard-Rite® Wind Machines and the service we receive. We still have the first Orchard-Rite® Wind Machine we ever bought! We're real believers in the Auto Start option. We order Auto Start on all our new machines. To date, we've retrofitted about 50% of our old machines, and plan to put the Auto Start on the remaining machines. Steve Nunley, Farming Operations Manager Pride Packing, Wapato, Washington Get the Orchard-Rite® story from your nearest representative: Steve Nunley s the operations manager for Pride Packing, I am responsible for managing 2,800 acres of orchard under 260 wind machines. Of that, approximately 1,000 acres are in stone fruit with the remaining 1615 W. Ahtanum • Yakima, WA 98903 • 509-248-8785, ext. 612 For the representative nearest you, visit our Web site: www.orchard-rite.com GOOD FRUIT GROWER APRIL 1, 2012 15

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