2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
The currant kidney mite develops exclusively inside the currant buds (mainly black, red and white currants are damaged by this pest much less often), provoking their rapid growth and subsequent deformation. Often in one kidney attacked by them, from three to eight thousand adult pests, as well as their larvae, accumulate. The deformed buds almost never bloom and dry out rather quickly, which in turn contributes to a sharp decrease in the yield of berries. And harmful mites are also able to carry the terry virus, which infects black currant flowers and turns them into sterile ones
Meet the pest
Currant kidney mite is a harmful parasite of microscopic size, painted in milky white tones with a slight slightly glassy tint. Its worm-like elongated body is characterized by ring-shaped segmentation, and a very short cephalothorax practically merges with it. The length of females, as a rule, does not exceed 0.2 mm, and males are even less. On the head parts of the pests, there are piercing-sucking mouth organs represented by needle-like jaws. All parasites have two pairs of legs, and their body ends with a pair of long tail setae. It is realistic to consider these voracious scoundrels only with a multiple increase.
Both wintering and the development of malicious pests take place in currant buds. By the way, it is very easy to find such kidneys - even in the fall they noticeably enlarge and become rounded. And with the onset of spring, the buds swell to the size of large peas, and particles of deformed leaves begin to protrude from under their expanding outer scales. Then the buds take on an external resemblance to bursting tiny cabbage heads and are painted in pale yellow tones.
In the spring, when the tiny buds begin to swell, and the average daily air temperature reaches five degrees or more, the females will begin to lay eggs. The egg-laying process lasts for about a month, and it is most intense in the period from the eighth to the twentieth day. The fertility of individual individuals often reaches from five to forty-eight eggs.
Six to twelve days after the eggs have been laid, harmful larvae begin to appear. As for the duration of their development, it depends mainly on the conditions of nutrition and on the temperature regime. And thirteen to twenty-five days after their hatching, voracious larvae are transformed into females of a new generation.
If the nutritional conditions of the pests worsen, and the buds, as the buds attacked by them dry out, begin to bare, then the harmful mites begin to migrate into new buds, which have just begun to form.
How to fight
Branches damaged by currant bud mites must be promptly cut off and immediately burned. With a weak population, it is sometimes enough and just to pluck out the affected kidneys. And in the case of a particularly severe infection, it is recommended to rejuvenate the berry bushes (that is, their complete pruning), followed by spraying the bases of the stems and the soil with a solution of colloidal sulfur.
Immediately before flowering, at the stage of formation of tiny inflorescences, treatments are carried out with "Aktellik", "Fitoverm" or colloidal sulfur. You can also use drugs such as "Fufanon" or "Karbofos". By the way, when spraying with sulfur preparations, it is important to try so that they do not fall on the gooseberry bushes growing nearby, otherwise a leaf burn may appear on them.
And to increase the resistance of currants to the kidney mite will help to comply with the basic agrotechnical rules. As for the preparation of cuttings for subsequent reproduction, they must be taken exclusively from healthy plants.
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