Last year we launched the Syngenta PestTracker - a tool to help us gauge the when we see insects hatching in the UK.
We were overwhelmed with the response from the industry with over 500 responses from you throughout the year.
This information has been incredibly useful and formed part of the Emergency Authorisation application for this season.
What we saw last year with CraneFly was that we had two distinct hatches, an Spring hatch and an Autumn one. Traditionally that was associated with two different species of Cranefly and whilst there's certainly some truth in that, the more time I spend looking at this I wonder if it's more to do with a simple age range.
When you look at the timeline of reported hatching it's clear to see that there is egg laying going on throughout the season and these are likely to result in variable hatch times. I'm sure the species of the Cranefly will have an impact but I suspect it's not the whole story.
The above chart shows the amount of reported sightings plotted over the top of a 6C GDD model. The red lines show the Cranefly sightings and we started seeing these hatching about this time last year. The main Spring hatch was in Mid May or between 300 - 450 GDD.
So we're reaching the point where we're likely to see some activity again, below is this years GDD and we're quickly sneaking up to that point again.
By continuing to log your sightings in PestTracker will help us understand exactly what's going on, begin to build a picture of how, when and where do they lay and hatch.
Click here to have a look at our ID guide on Greencast.......
Now watch the movie and find out about last years Chafer Results.
