2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
The Californian scale insect lives in the southwestern and southern regions of Russia. In addition to various berry and fruit crops, it also damages over two hundred varieties of ornamental and forest plants. These harmful parasites suck out juices not only from tree trunks and twigs, but also from fruits with leaves. The bark in the areas damaged by them cracks, the deforming leaves fall off, the shoots are bent, and reddish specks form on the fruits in the places where the Californian scale insects are sucked. If the damage is very significant, then the weakened trees slowly begin to dry out
Meet the pest
The females of the Californian scale insect are endowed with round shields, the diameter of which reaches about 2 mm. The scutes themselves are painted in grayish-brownish tones, and in their center there is a pair of yellow larval skins. The plump females under the shields, which have a lemon-yellow color, grow up to 1.3 mm in length and are equipped with a developed prickly apparatus.
In males of the Californian scale insect, the scutes are oval in shape and reach a length of 1 mm. The size of adult males ranges from 0.8 to 0.9 mm. All males are colored light orange and have one transverse stripe on their breasts. Their legs and antennae are well developed, in addition, these pests are endowed with a well-developed pair of wings. But their oral apparatus is reduced.
Harmful oval larvae of the first instar, called "tramps", grow to 0.25 mm and are light yellow in color. Larvae of the second instar are slightly larger - their length is approximately 0.42 mm. The color and shape of the bodies of the larvae are similar to those of females.
Larvae of both the first and second centuries hibernate on the bark of twigs and trunks under the shields. As soon as sap flow begins in the spring, they wake up and start feeding. And after 20 - 22 days, after the larvae pass a couple of molts, they will turn into adult females. Closer to mid-May, the emergence of males also starts, the number of which is extremely limited - of the entire population, males make up only two to nine percent.
Within forty to sixty days, the females revive from eighty to one hundred "vagrant" larvae, spreading and sucking on the skeletal parts of various trees, as well as on fruits and leaves. After they adhere to the selected surfaces, the pests lose their mobility, becoming covered with wax threads on top. From such threads, more precisely from their weaves, white shields are formed, darkening after three to four days. And seven to eight days after the gray shields are formed, the larvae molt for the first time. The second molt is observed ten to twelve days later, and immediately after its termination, the larvae become adult females. The development of the larvae of both females and males is completely identical before the first molt, and their subsequent formation is already marked by complete transformation.
The males emerging from under the shields do not feed at all. And after mating, they instantly die. Already at the beginning of August, the appearance of "vagrants" of the second generation is noted, as well as larvae, which subsequently go to winter.
Californian scale insects are quite plastic pests. They are able to withstand changes in air humidity ranging from thirty to ninety percent and temperature fluctuations in the range from minus thirty-five degrees to plus forty-three.
How to fight
To protect yourself from the Californian scale insect, you must comply with quarantine measures to prevent its spread. Skeletal branches and tree trunks must be systematically cleaned of dying bark, and damaged and dry branches, along with root shoots, must be cut out and quickly burned.
At the stage of revival of the "vagrant" larvae, spraying with various insecticides is carried out. And in order for the effect of such spraying to be as good as possible, during the treatment it is important to ensure that the whole tree is thoroughly moistened with the solution, including the smallest cracks on its bark.
In nature, the Californian scale insect is often infested by riders from the chalcid family and a number of other pests.
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