The week of July 22 the trap cacthes dropped to 32.9 per trap, compared to 172.8 per trap one year ago. This reflects the observations we are making in fields. The beet armyworms are generally absent.

Whiteflies:
Several consultants and producers have expressed concern about the numbers of whiteflies they are seeing. There are a few fields where the numbers of whiteflies have reached a point that there is honeydew on plant leaves. Generally this is light and washes off with the next pass of the pivot, but the number of whiteflies increases.

The whitefly that we have is the banded wing whitefly and should not be confused with the silverleaf whitefly that has caused so many problems in the Rio Grande Valley and in Arizona. The adult banded wing whitefly is small in size and resembles little pieces of ash floating around when disturbed.

The basic life cycle of whiteflies is egg, nymph, adult with the nymphs going through a pseudo pupal stage before emerging as adults. Eggs are laid in the terminal area of the plant and will hatch in about five days. Newly hatched nymphs are very small, clear and disced shape.

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The nymphs will feed for about five days turn a yellowish green color and will enter the psuedo pupal stage. It takes generally 14 days to go from egg to adult.

The economic threshold that we are using at present is an average of 75 to 100 adult and nymphs on the fifth mainstem leaf down from the top of the plant. The reason we are using this high number is at these infestation numbers we are getting honeydew production. Brant Baugh, Extension Agent-I.P.M., Lubbock County and myself established a chemical control test last Thursday in a heavily infested field east of Idalou. So far, the control measure that seems to be working for us is a combination of Pyrethroid with Orthene for control of adults. We will be taking 8 day post treatment counts on Friday.

Peanut Pests:
Private consultants report finding a few wireworms, southern corn rootworms and spider mites, but not presently at economically damaging levels. With the hot dry weather conditions be on the lookout for spider mites and the possibility of lesser cornstalk borers to increase in numbers.

Africanized Bee Information:
Recently Africanized honey bees have been confirmed in Lubbock and Cochran Counties. Due to this we should pay more careful attention to our surroundings while out-of-doors. Locations which are particularly inviting to Africanized bees include: abandoned buildings, old and run down bee hives and hollow tree limbs/trunks. If you notice bees swarming avoid them. For information on these pests visit the Africanized Honey Bee website: http://lubbock.tamu.edu/ahb or contact our office. Extension does not remove bees, you must contact a licenced pest control firm for that service.

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