2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
The large potato aphid, just like the ordinary potato aphid, damages almost all crops grown in greenhouses (potatoes, peppers, lettuce, cabbage, eggplants, etc.). It is dangerous because it is a carrier of a huge number of viral diseases of vegetation (and there are more than fifty such viruses). The special harmfulness of the large potato aphid is due to the fact that it releases toxins that cause various morphological changes in plants
Meet the pest
The body of the female of the large potato aphid is elongated, elongated-oval, slightly tapering towards the rear ends. The body length of wingless virgin females is about 4 mm. Their bodies are usually painted in greenish tones, however, sometimes such females can be painted in reddish shades. The antennae are longer than their bodies, and there are small grooves on the foreheads. And the tubes of these pests reach 1/3 of the length of their bodies. All of them are endowed with long xiphoid tails and have five hairs on both sides.
The tails, the first three segments of the antennae, breast and heads of winged individuals are colored in light brownish tones, and their legs and thighs are dark brown. In length, winged females grow up to 3.4 mm. These parasites reproduce in a parthenogenetic way.
By analogy with the common potato aphid, these pests are characterized by an incomplete cycle type of development. Wingless virgin females winter on weeds in greenhouses. They usually enter greenhouses with parsley and celery, along with the infested planting material. And when in January-February the planting of cucumbers and a number of other vegetable crops in greenhouses begins, the parasites will immediately move from parsley with celery to these crops.
The large potato aphid mainly inhabits the undersides of the leaves and shoots. And on the upper sides of the leaves, their molted skins accumulate, along with abundant honeydew, which, after some time, becomes covered with an unpleasant sooty fungus. Damage to each of the crops has its own peculiarities inherent only to them. For example, on tomato leaves in feeding places of sucking parasites, chlorotic specks of a round shape can be seen, and leaves and their lobes attacked by pests dry out. A yellow net is formed on the leaves of the cucumber, and along the leaf veins, their tissues are necrotic.
How to fight
Weeds growing near greenhouses with greenhouses must be destroyed in a timely manner. Observance of the appropriate agrotechnical technology for the cultivation of certain crops will also be important.
The large potato aphid has many natural enemies, among which parasitic and predatory insects prevail. Moreover, these harmful parasites are often affected by a huge number of entomopathogenic fungi. Aphidiids of the Praon genus stand apart among natural enemies - by the end of summer their useful activity literally increases significantly. In general, the whole complex of beneficial organisms effectively acts during wet periods (and at the end of summer and with the onset of autumn in particular), provoking the death of up to seventy to eighty percent of aphids.
Of the chemicals used in the fight against large potato aphids, the drug "Aktara" has proven itself well. They are not only sprayed with growing crops, but also shed the soil. And the pre-planting treatment of potato tubers is recommended using Celest Top (insect-fungicidal preparation) or Cruiser (insecticidal preparation). All growing crops can be treated with neonicotinoids, as well as various organophosphorus compounds and numerous pyrethroids. You can spray vegetation with biological pesticides.
In general, the same measures that are used in the fight against peach aphids can be used to protect against large potato aphids.
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