Turf Insect Pest

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Turf Insect Pest
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Introduction

• Turfgrass value functional, aesthetic, and
  economic
• All values adversely affected by pest
• Over 300 million acres of turf in the US
• 81 percent in more than 50 million lawns
• 19 percent in parks, golf courses, athletic
  fields, cemeteries, sod farms, roadsides, other
  sites
• Turfgrass culture a 25 plus billion dollar per
  year industry in the US

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Introduction

• 500,000 plus people make their living directly
  from the establishment and maintenance of turf
• 25 to 30 million households use pesticides at
  least once yearly on lawns to control insect
  pests _at_ cost gt 1 billion dollars

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Driving Factors in Turfgrass Pest Management

• Increasing demand for high quality turf
• Increasing public concern about potential risks
  to human health and environment

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Diagnosis and Sampling of Insect Pests

• Damage caused by insects can often be confused
  with diseases, drought, or pesticide injury
• Therefore, proper diagnosis is the first step in
  any successful control program

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Diagnosis and Sampling of Insect Pests

• Specific pest identification (start with
  suspects)
• Sampling (based on suspected causes of damage)

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Diagnosis Guided by the Use of the Knowledge
Regarding

• Type of damage
• Location of habitat
• Season of occurrence
• Other clues

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General Indications of Potential or Actual Insect
Pest Problems

• Surface Feeding
• Large numbers of birds feeding on turf area
• Small moths flying zigzag patterns over the turf
  surface, especially in late evening
• Rapid loss of green color similar to fertilizer
  burn or drought injury, even though the area is
  adequately irrigated
• Frass at or near the soil surface

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General Indications of Potential or Actual Insect
Pest Problems

• Subsurface feeding
• Loose turf surface indicated by poor footing or
  excessive traffic injury
• Damage to turf by insect feeding mammals (moles,
  skunks, and raccoons)
• Overall thinning of turf
• Chlorotic areas/ patches of browning turf

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Three Major Habitat areas for Insects in Turf

• Leaves and stems
• Thatch
• Soil

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Insect Pest in/on Leaves and Stems

• Most easily controlled because treatments may be
  applied directly timing of application is the
  most important criterion
• Detected by careful examination of stems, leaf
  sheath and leaves (May require magnification)
• Bermudagrass mite
• Winter grain mite
• Rhodesgrass mealybug
• Greenbug
• Fruit fly

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Insect Pest in Thatch

• Thick thatch (grater than ½ inch) attracts
  chinch bugs and others. May impede penetration of
  pesticides into the soil
• Chinch bugs
• Sod webworms
• Cutworms
• Armyworms
• Fiery skipper

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Insect Pest in ThatchDetection

• Flotation primarily to determine the presence or
  absence of chinch bugs
• Detergent flushes for caterpillars, weevils, mole
  crickets and other insects
• With either of these techniques, it is important
  to sample at the edges of heavily damaged areas
  since the highest insect populations are often
  located here rather than in areas already
  exhibiting severe damage

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Insect Pest in the Soil

• Much more restricted in movement
• Mole crickets
• Ground pearls
• White grubs
• Billbugs
• European cranefly
• Primary sampling by examination of the root zone
  and the soil and sod
• Soap flushes work well for mole crickets

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Types of Damage

• Chewing insects most common type among turfgrass
  insects
• They have strong mandibles which bite or sever
  tissues
• Damage symptoms exhibit physical removal of plant
  tissues
• Stripping away of the epidermis of leaves
• Notching of leaves and stems
• Complete severing of plant parts

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Types of DamageChewing Insects Cont.

• Hollowing out of stems and crowns
• Pruning of roots
• Most chewing insects of turf are immature forms
  (larvae and nymphs) but a few adults are also
  included
• Common chewing pest White grubs, armyworms, mole
  crickets, sod webworms

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Types of DamageSucking Insects

• Sucking insects pierce and suck plant tissue with
  modified mouthparts that form a beak which
  surrounds needle-like mandibles and maxillae
• Salivary secretions (sometimes toxic to the
  plant) are pumped into the plant to aid in
  sucking up plant sap and cell contents
• Plants injured by this method of feeding
  generally remain completely intact

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Types of DamageSucking Insects Cont.

• The entire plant starts to deteriorate because of
  the loss of plant sap or in the response to the
  injection of toxic salivary secretions
• Early symptoms Yellowing, wilting, blasting of
  leaves, necrosis, followed by browning and death
  of plant
• Both adults and nymphs of piercing sucking
  insects damage turf
• Common insects in this group include chinch bugs,
  greenbugs, and ground pearls

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Seasonal Occurrence

• Differences in seasonal occurrence of insects and
  damage provides diagnostic clue
• Winter only the winter grain mite causes damage
  during winter
• Spring European crane fly, mole crickets in warm
  humid regions, and the single generation
  scarabaeids may cause damage in the spring
• Summer everything else (for example multiple
  generations of scarabaeids)
• Fall Mole crickets and white grubs

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Value of early Detection

• Early symptoms frequently evident before the
  actual pest is observed
• Damage can progress rapidly when large numbers of
  insects are present
• Some insects easier to control in early stage of
  development

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Early Symptoms

• First symptom of damage caused by leaf and
  stem-feeding insects is yellowing of leaves in
  small isolated patches
• Root feeders cause a gradual thinning of the turf
• Positive attribution of symptoms to a pest
  requires determination that the pest is present
  in a damaging stage
• Dead or brown turf may no longer be harboring the
  pest responsible
• Proper identification is important for proper
  treatment and prevention

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfCultural
Control

• Host plant resistance
• The underling susceptibility or suitability or
  the lack thereof principle method of
  controlexhibits constant pressure of each pest
  generationimmunity is the ultimate level but
  rarely obtainableexhibition of various degrees
  of resistance or susceptibility to best
• Endophytes sometimes contribute to resistance

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfCultural
Control

• Turf Vigor
• Vigorous, steadily growing stands can deter
  permanent turf damage
• Rapidly growing rhizomes and stolons quickly fill
  in small localized dead patches
• High nitrogen fertilizer can help recover a
  generally thinned stand

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfCultural
Control

• Soil Moisture
• In high temperature and moisture stress, two
  groups of insects, chinch bugs and sod webworms,
  do most of their damage, with the grass going
  into dormancy, making damage difficult to detect
• When adequate moisture is present, symptoms of
  damage are easier to detect in the form of yellow
  leaves and small brown patches

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfCultural
Control

• Thatch Management
• Affects some insects directly (chinch bugs), also
  affects the efficacy of insecticide applications
• Many organic insecticides adsorb to organic
  matter
• Dursban is very readily bound to thatch
• Many registered pesticides are broken down
  readily in UV light, and so they must penetrate
  quickly to do their job

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfBiological
Control

• Predators, parasites, and pathogens that attack
  pest species. Predators include other insects and
  sometimes vertebrates
• Advantages of natural controls include their
  safety, relative permanence, and relative
  economy, although all of these dont apply in all
  cases

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfBiological
Control

• Predators
• Free-living organisms that consume a prey
  relatively non-specific such as
• Ground beetles, spiders, some ants, big-eyed
  bugs, phytoseiid mites and staphalinids common

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfBiological
Control

• Parasitoids
• Insects that have a parasite-like relationship to
  their host, resulting in host death, develop
  inside host quite host-specific, include a
  number of Hymenoptera and Diptera

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfBiological
Control

• Pathogens
• Fungi, viruses, and bacterial organisms, with
  some nematodes and protozoans host specific,
  potentially self-sustaining, depend heavily on
  environmental conditions to work
• milky disease (bacterial disease of Japanese
  beetle grubs)
• B. thuringiensis, a commercially used pathogen of
  lepidoptera and others
• Nematodes , commercially inoculated with a
  bacterial pathogen, used against a number of
  soil-dwelling turf pests

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Insect Control Strategies for TurfChemical
Controls

• Pesticides (see current state recommendations)
• Important to follow label directions accurately
• Adherence to legal requirements may be necessary
• Most must be watered in after application