Last year’s Syngenta PestTracker exercise showed far more engagement from CraneFly spotters than by Chafer watchers. Why is this?
- The number of reported flights tell a story-
- Cranefly – 460
- Welsh Chafer – 21
- CockChafer- 19
- Garden Chafer- 19
- Summer Chafer – 3
2019 did seem to be a low pressure year for Chafers, less reported turf issues than I can remember, which is great news. But why was that – was it the dry spring or the incredibly dry summer we had in 2018? Did the very wet end of June effect things??
What did we learn about the flight patterns? This seemed to be lot more variable than Cranefly and the reported insects flights seemed to fill all of May and June. There was no obvious area or time when the different species hatched.
With the number of sightings spotting a pattern is pretty tricky. So was last year a very low pressure year or do we need a better understanding of when then fly?
Here’s a link to a really useful Turf Pest ID Guide on the greencast website.
Now watch the Movie: Pest Tracker 2019.
