SportsTurf

September 2016

SportsTurf provides current, practical and technical content on issues relevant to sports turf managers, including facilities managers. Most readers are athletic field managers from the professional level through parks and recreation, universities.

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IRRIGATION & DRAINAGE 24 SportsTurf | September 2016 www.sportsturfonline.com FIELD SCIENCE TURF PEST MANAGEMENT FAQS be too finicky on which turf they feed. FAQ: What tips do you have regarding application timing? What is too early? What is too late? Troutman: Timing is critical for most applications to control pests. Weeds are easiest to control in the seedling stage. Often it is easier to prevent problems by controlling overwinter adult insects before they breed in early summer. With caterpillars, in most cases control must be delayed until the problem occurs. Research and recommendations from land grant universities are the best guide for control timing in each region of the country and professionals watch them closely. McGraw: That all depends on what you are finding by actively scouting the turf. Sampling is required to answer that question. FAQ: What impact would neonicotinoid bans on pesticides have on the ability to control insects? Troutman: Banning of neonicotinoids would create potentially huge control problems. It would eliminate one of landscape and agriculture's most critical resistant management alternatives. In an urban environment, neonics are the only effective control for tree-killing pests like the emerald ash borer. They are much less toxic than other products used to control white grubs. McGraw: The potential ban of neonicotinoids would have a major impact on a sports turf manager's operation. White grubs are likely to be the major insect pest that they are dealing with (independent of region within North America). That being said, white grubs have been, and continue to be, effectively managed with one insecticide application per year. Between the 1990s and today, neonicotinoids have been the number one product for that control. Since these products have been around since the 1990s, many active ingredients are "off-patent," allowing generics to enter the market and reduce the cost of an application. Although there are newer products on the market (e.g. anthranilic diamides like Acelepryn), the neonicotinoids remain much cheaper. A ban of neonicotinoids would cause the cost of controls to increase dramatically. FAQ:Is the current pollinator issue and "bee-friendly" movement legitimate? Troutman: Bee populations are indeed threatened, but it's not just about insecticide use. The honeybee is intensively R eaders sent us their turf pest management questions, and we posed the most frequently asked questions (FAQs) to a couple of industry experts — Barry Troutman, Ph.D., National Association of Landscape Professionals technical advisor; and Benjamin McGraw, Ph.D., Pennsylvania State University associate professor, turfgrass science. Their feedback is as follows: FAQ: What recommendations do you have for managing pesticides in rotation to reduce the possibility of resistance being built up in the pest to certain chemicals? Troutman: Rotation of pesticide modes of action is important, particularly on insects that have multiple generations in one season. We are currently limited to only a few mode of action alternatives. The most frequently used are pyrethoids and neonicotinoids, which have replaced the much more toxic organo-phosphates and carbamate insecticides. McGraw: Pesticide resistance is not a major concern for the vast majority of product plus insect combinations in sports turf. The two species of insects where insecticide resistance is an issue are either golf course (annual bluegrass weevil) or home lawn (southern chinch bug on St. Augustine grass) problems. So, not a huge concern with the insects we have, given the products used and the number of generations per year. That is not to say that it will never be an issue. FAQ: Do insects have a turf species preference? If so, what insects prefer what grass species? Troutman: Insects are absolutely preferential feeders, and insect problems also vary by geography. There are nearly a dozen different species of white grubs each with slightly different life cycles that feed on root systems of turfgrasses. The southern chinchbug feeds on St. Augustine but not on other turf species, while the northern chinchbug feeds only on Bluegrasses. Tropical sod webworm is really particular, it will eat crabgrass first, then move to Bermudagrass before eating St. Augustine or Bahiagrass. The interactions are extremely complex, and knowing them is what makes us professionals. McGraw: That is a pretty big and general question. Some sports turf insects may have a narrow diet (e.g. Black turfgrass ataenius might be found in Poa annua patches in an outfield), whereas others do not care about species as much as they would site conditions (e.g. irrigated turf vs. droughty turf). To speak generally, the major insect pest issues on sports turf (white grubs, mole crickets) are likely to be generalists and not

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