Getting Rid Of The Plum Moth

2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38

The plum moth lives almost everywhere, damaging not only plums with cherry plums, but also thorns, peaches, apricots, and a little less often cherries and cherries. A wormy plum is, as a rule, the result of the destructive activity of this pest. You can and should fight the enemy, otherwise you won't have to wait for an excellent harvest

Meet the pest

The pests are moths with a wingspan of 13-15 mm. Their front wings are dark brown in color with a slight tint of a violet tint, and the hind wings are gray-brown.

The size of the plum moth eggs is 0.7 mm; the eggs themselves are translucent and flat, slightly rounded, initially they are white, and then yellow-green. Caterpillars 12 - 15 mm long, young ones are pale white, older ones are pale pink, with dark brown heads and legs. Pupae are light brown, about 7 - 8 mm long, with smoothly rounded abdominal ends.

Overwintering of caterpillars that have completed their feeding takes place in spider cocoons in plant debris, under slightly peeling bark on tree trunks, in cracks in the bark, and also in the surface layer of the soil. As soon as the average daily temperature exceeds the threshold of 10 degrees, after 10 - 15 days the parasites begin to pupate (usually at the same time, the buds of late varieties of plum begin to peel off). The pupation process is somewhat extended in time (however, as well as the subsequent stages of development) and is approximately 35 - 45 days. The development of pupae takes about 15 - 26 days, and after another 12 - 15 days, you can already see the massive years of butterflies, the greatest activity of which falls on the time interval after 17 hours (the air temperature should be at least 16 - 17 degrees). As soon as the temperature begins to drop to 12-13 degrees, not only the years of parasites end, but also the laying of eggs. The most suitable temperature for them is 24 - 26 degrees.

3 - 5 days after emergence, females lay eggs on the lighted areas of fruits - almost always one at a time, but it happens in 2 - 3. Eggs can still be laid on the lower surfaces of the leaves (as a rule, middle and lower tiers of tree crowns). The total fertility of females of the enemy plum is 50 - 90 eggs. The revival of caterpillars is noted 5-10 days later. They immediately begin to move along the surfaces of the fruit - the duration of such "walks" can range from several minutes to several hours.

Before penetrating the fruit, the caterpillars braid the selected areas with cobwebs, and already under them they begin to bite into the skin. As soon as they are inside the juicy fruit, they cover the holes with fruit stubs with cobwebs. The damaged areas are easy to calculate - small droplets of gum are formed on them. Another 3 - 5 days later, caterpillars in the juicy pulp form numerous passages. Reaching the cuttings, they immediately gnaw through the bundles, which in turn leads to a disruption in the flow of nutrients to the fruits and to the cessation of their growth. Affected fruits, acquiring a purple hue and ripening ahead of time, quickly fall off. In young fruits, unhardened bones with pulp are damaged by parasites, in mature fruits, they gnaw all the pulp near the bones by them, and the formed cavities are filled with parasites with their own excrement. The development period for these caterpillars is approximately 20 to 30 days.

How to get rid of

Arthropod parasites can significantly reduce the number of uninvited guests, and about 5-10% of plum moths are infected with entomophages.

Against all generations of enemies, plum trees are sprayed with various insecticides. Initial processing usually falls on the initial stage of caterpillar revival. For spraying, agents such as gardona, phosphamide, dursban, cydial, zolone, antiio, metathion, karbofos, chlorophos and metaphos are often used. Re-spraying is allowed no earlier than 15 days later. And 15 days later, for the late varieties of plums and cherry plums, the third spraying is organized (however, no later than a month before the start of the harvest).

Good results can be achieved by using a pheromone (funemon) to disorient males. It will also be effective to constantly collect the wormy carrion and use all kinds of trapping belts (made of corrugated paper, burlap and other materials). On boles with skeletal branches, it is important to regularly clean off dead bark. Also, in order to reduce the population of the enemy, the ground in the tree-trunk circles must be constantly dug up, and in early spring, skeletal branches and tree trunks should be whitewashed with slaked lime.