Due to the rain, an abbreviated IPM session was held today.
Continuing the strawberry analysis from last week, Rob Mazza provided additional data. The picking of strawberries is nearing completion for the May-June period. (Ever bearing berries may be picked later this year). After harvesting strawberries for the past 22 days for 20 plants, a total of 3,551 berries were picked. A total of 62.9 pounds of strawberries were harvested, which averaged a little more than 3 pounds per plant. As mentioned last week, in the near future the plants will be cut back and old straw replaced with new to mitigate gray mold disease in the future
A quick walk through the field corn is showing very noticeable insect damage to the non-BT corn, mainly from the corn borer. Since the corn borer can have multiple generations in one season, one can see that non-BT corn can be severely weakened by the corn borer and blown down by high winds before a September-October harvest. The field corn is in the 8th to 9th leaf stage.
The soybeans planted around May 15 are in the 6th trifoliate leaf stage. The soybean field behind them and the field corn are starting to pick up with the recent rainfall. There was about .5 inch of rainfall received this morning. These soybeans were not planted too deeply due to the earlier dry weather. Additional soybeans were seeded over the oat field that was recently harvested.
In the demonstration plots the millet seeds and broomcorn seeds are beginning to germinate. They were both weeded on Wendesday. The millet will need about 1.5 cups of fertilizer, while the broomcorn will need to be thinned out. The pumpkin plants are showing damage from the cucumber beetle, grasshoppers and moths. Today there were about 10 cucumber beetles in one pumpkin flower alone. The hops are beginning to sprout their buds. The scent from the lupulin bud was evident. The blueberries are beginning to ripen. Both the Bell peppers and hot peppers are growing well at this early stage.
Below is the weekly summary for the insects caught in the four insect traps. Once again, traps 3 and 4 are collecting the most insects.
Trap 1 (Black Cut Worm) – Nothing.
Trap 2 (European Corn Borer) – 1 chaffer beetle.
Trap 3 (Fall Army Worm) – 14 true army worm 1 each bumble bee, diptera and coleoptera
Trap 4 (Corn Ear Worm) – 18 noctuids, 2 chaffer beetles, 1 each sap beetle and corn borer.
Notes compiled by John Siemanowski
