Potato crops can be seriously damaged by various insects. Since potato pests cause serious damage to plants and can reduce yields, you need to know how to properly deal with them.

We will tell you how to recognize the main pests and properly deal with Colorado potato beetles, wireworms and nematodes with chemical means and folk methods.

The main potato pests: their description and treatment

Potato tubers and bushes can be affected by pests at all stages of cultivation. In our article you will find the necessary information about these insects, their photos, descriptions and treatment methods that will help save the crop.

The danger is represented by potato moth, bear and aphids. All of them cause damage to plants, slowing down their growth and the formation of tubers. Detailed description pests and methods of dealing with them will be given below.

Golden nematode (methods and control measures)

A nematode is a small helminth that feeds on tubers and roots. There are several types of nematodes, but the golden nematode is the most dangerous (Figure 2).

The larvae hatch in the spring and penetrate into the potato roots. Feeding on tissues, they greatly slow down the growth of the plant. The leaves of an infected bush are small, yellow and wither quickly. When a nematode is damaged, too small tubers are formed on the bush, and there are a lot of insects, there may not be a crop at all.

Note: Mass infection with the golden nematode requires the introduction of quarantine. The soil on the site is treated with special chemicals and is not used for growing crops for another 5 years.

To combat the nematode, the following means are used:

• Before starting field work, the soil is treated with urea, and after harvesting it is sprinkled with lime;
• Fertilizer with liquid chicken manure can destroy nematode larvae in the soil. Fertilization is carried out immediately after planting;
• All planting material is carefully inspected before planting;
• Infected bushes are dug up and treated with bleach in a specially dug hole.

Figure 2. Golden nematode and signs of pest damage on tubers

To prevent infection with a nematode, you can not plant potatoes in one place for more than three years in a row. But if pests still appear, you need to treat the plantings with Bazudin, which eliminates not only nematodes, but also wireworms.

Wireworms in potatoes: how to get rid of them

These are beetle larvae that can stay and develop in the soil for several years. Under favorable conditions, the larvae awaken and begin to destroy the crop (Figure 3).

Figure 3. Symptoms of wireworm damage

Insects are especially active when the soil is not moist enough. They penetrate roots and tubers, burrowing through them, reducing product quality and making plants more susceptible to disease.

How to deal with wireworm on potatoes? First of all, you need to deeply plow the earth in order to destroy the larvae. In addition, in the process of growing, it is imperative to weed out the weeds, and lay out baits in small areas (for example, slices of raw potatoes). They will attract nematode larvae and can be destroyed by hand.

How to process potatoes before planting

Preparations from this insect are very diverse, and differ in the principle of action and price. Similar preparations are used to treat tubers before planting. This allows you to strengthen the plants and make them more resistant to diseases and pest larvae.

For processing potatoes before planting, Prestige or the Russian analogue of Taboo is most often used. Tubers can be processed in a container by simply spraying them with the preparation. In addition, you can prepare a solution and apply it to the wells directly upon planting.

Wireworm Remedies

How to get rid of wireworm on potatoes, if it did appear? For the treatment of bushes use the same drug Prestige. However, there are other means that are similar in action.

You can process landings with the help of chemicals Cruiser, Picus, Imidor or Commander. In composition, they are close to Prestige, but, in addition to the wireworm, they are able to destroy larvae and adults of other pests, in particular the Colorado potato beetle and nematodes.

Chemicals for processing potatoes from a wireworm

To protect potatoes during cultivation, they are treated with special chemicals. They can be used both for pre-sowing treatment and for pest control directly during the cultivation of vegetables.

Wireworm medications include(picture 4):

1. Cruiser- insecticide of system action which destroys many ground and underground insects;
2. Celeste Top- an effective remedy against diseases and pests;
3. Voliam Flexi- an insecticide consisting of two components. It is used against aphids, the Colorado potato beetle and wireworms;
4. force- a drug that quickly destroys the larvae even before the onset of damage to the tubers.

Figure 4. Preparations against wireworm

Chemicals are regularly updated, so when buying, it is better to familiarize yourself with the assortment and choose several drugs at once for a complex effect.

How to deal with the Colorado potato beetle

This is the main pest of potatoes. The mass invasion of these insects can lead to the fact that for a short time only bare stems will remain from green bushes (Figure 5).

Figure 5. Damage to crops by Colorado potato beetles

After germination, potatoes need to be treated with drugs against this type of pest.

What is better to poison

How to deal with these insects on potatoes? Of course, with the help of special chemicals. Common drugs include (Figure 6):

• Systemic chemicals Mospilan, Sonnet, Commander, Iskra. They are applied three times during the entire growing season. But the last treatment should be carried out no later than 3 weeks before harvest.
• Preparations of fungal and bacterial origin Fitoverm, Boverin and Agrovertin quickly destroy young larvae. After one treatment, the drug continues to act, causing the death of insects within a week.

Figure 6. Means against the Colorado potato beetle

You can not use the same drugs for several seasons in a row. Insects gradually get used to certain means, so chemicals need to be alternated.

Remedies for the Colorado potato beetle

Folk remedies also exist. But they are only suitable for small areas, since their use is associated with serious labor costs. For example, beetles and their larvae can be collected by hand. But since insects easily fly from one bush to another, this procedure will have to be constantly repeated.

Also, spraying with infusions of mint, poplar, basil and blackcurrant leaves is used to control insects. Strong smell liquid will repel insects. The first treatment is carried out immediately after germination and then repeated several times per season. You can plant beans or coriander next to potatoes. The smell of these plants will help reduce the number of pests.

In addition, there is a distracting way to fight. To do this, you need to plant a few tubers before the rest. Large green bushes will attract pests and are much easier to pick up and destroy.

From the video you will learn the recipe for making an environmentally friendly means of dealing with the Colorado potato beetle.

Potato moth is a moth gray color, whose caterpillars destroy the leaves and stems of plants, but do not touch the ripened tubers (Figure 7).

In order to prevent damage to the bushes by moths, it is necessary to control the quality of the planting material. The larvae can be destroyed by heating the tubers in warm water at a temperature of 40 degrees. In addition, when planting, the tubers must be planted to a depth of at least 15 cm, and during the growing process, hilling and weeding should be carried out several times.

Figure 7. Appearance of potato moth

In autumn, the soil should be plowed deep to kill the remaining larvae and butterflies, and the tubers treated with a methyl bromide solution before laying in storage. In case of mass damage, spraying with insecticides (Lepidocid, Entobacterin, etc.) is used. Spraying is carried out before the formation of ovaries. This will weaken the insects and delay the development of young individuals.

Protection and prevention

Preventing the spread of pests will help keep plants healthy. First of all, for this you need to carry out deep plowing of the soil in the fall. This will help destroy the larvae left in the soil.

In the process of growing, it is recommended to carry out hilling and remove weeds several times. These plants may contain both adults and larvae. Hilling allows you to loosen the soil to a greater depth, which also helps to eliminate young insects. In addition, tubers can be treated with special prophylactic agents before planting, and insecticides can be used already during the growing process.

Facilities

There are effective folk remedies that will help prevent the invasion of pests. However, they require a lot of labor and do not have the effectiveness of chemical agents. At the same time, in small areas, the use of folk remedies for prevention can be very effective.

During landing in the hole, you can throw a little wood ash. It will scare away insects and prevent the larvae from developing. In addition, plants with a pronounced smell (for example, calendula, basil or dill) can be planted next to potatoes.

An effective means of protecting tubers is the treatment of planting material with a solution of potassium permanganate. The ash solution has the same effect. The ash is simply dissolved in a bucket and the potatoes are dipped into the liquid. This treatment helps to protect planting material from diseases and pests.

Preparations

Chemical agents are considered to be a more effective means of protecting against pests. The most popular drug for prevention is Prestige, and its domestic analogue Taboo.

The finished solution of the drug can simply be poured into the hole when planting or the tubers can be sprayed a few days before planting. After processing, the potatoes must be dried.

The author of the video will tell you how to properly deal with potato pests.

Who eats potatoes in the ground straight gnaws

Good afternoon, readers! Our team at work is friendly, so in anticipation of new year holidays decided to organize such an idea.

A kind of lottery. We write the names of all employees in the department on notes, mix the notes, and everyone pulls out a note with someone's name, to whom they give a symbolic present.

So, during this lottery, one of her colleagues joked that she would be glad to receive potatoes as a gift, because someone ate her entire crop. Who eats potatoes in the ground, gnaws straight out - a good question to think about. Reading!

Our readers sent a photo of a damaged potato and ask the question: who gnaws the tubers? Gardeners have different assumptions - a scoop, a bear, a water rat, beetles ... We asked Irina IVANOVA, a plant protection specialist, to comment on the photo. Here is what she said:

“Judging by the photograph provided, it can be said that insects do not damage like that. Sometimes slugs eat away the flesh of the tuber to such a depth, but then the edges near the cavity should then be more even. In this case, I assume that rodents worked, perhaps a water rat, if by that they mean a water vole (Arvicola terrestris), and not a muskrat.

But this is just a guess. You can make sure if you find long underground passages with noticeable soil ejections. Perfect option- an ambush at night with a shovel, a hidden flashlight and a readiness to instantly tear up the ground. Although not everyone likes such adventurous diagnostics.”

Let's get to know each other better

The water vole, an animal with a short, blunt muzzle and small ears, is a distant relative of hamsters. The body, covered with dark brown hair with a red tinge, reaches a length of 20 cm, pubescent tail - at least 10 cm.

The water vole is a massive pest of agricultural crops and pastures. Harms in gardens, vegetable gardens, in places where vegetables are stored. It usually settles along the banks of rivers, lakes, ponds, next to a swamp, but often it can be found far from water - in meadows, vegetable gardens, fields.

Closer to autumn, voles move to vegetable gardens and orchards, where they build underground settlements for several families.

Rodents are very voracious, they can forage from a depth of 40–60 cm. They do not hibernate in the winter, so they are forced to make very large food supplies.

Why are there more of them

All mouse-like rodents are characterized by sudden bursts of numbers, which is associated with their ability to reproduce. Some scientists believe that the increase in numbers coincides with the cycles of solar activity (according to various opinions, 11-year or 7-year ones). It is also believed that the reason is in the wrong management of agriculture.

Favorable conditions for the life and reproduction of rodents are created with shallow tillage with flaws, careless harvesting, the presence of row spacing and wide roadsides covered with weeds. In such cases, rodents have more food in a small area of ​​​​habitat, less likely to die from predators.

Death from natural causes

The number of mouse-like rodents can naturally decrease with their mass death in winter during sharp thaws with snow melting. Water entering the holes drives the animals out, while it freezes, clogging the exits.

In nature, voles have many enemies - foxes, ferrets, weasels, as well as feathered predators.

Domestic cats also help rid the garden of rodents. Reduce the number of mouse-like rodents and diseases in which they die by the thousands.

Control measures

Warning: elimination of wide borders, roadsides overgrown with weeds; careful digging of the earth; timely harvesting; constant collection of carrion of fruit trees; v orchards binding for the winter of trunks and skeletal branches of young trees with spruce branches (needles down), roofing material, nylon fabric, fine-mesh metal mesh; periodic compaction (trampling) of snow around trunks in winter; protection of useful birds of prey and animals.

Destructive: laying out permitted drugs in holes or other shelters, for example, GryzNet-agro - 2 capsules per hole (in this case, you should follow safety measures, work with gloves, use special spoons or scoops, and also exclude access to the holes of other animals ); the use of traps, which are usually set at the entrance to rodent burrows.

source: http://sotki.ru/zachita_rasteniy/article/kto-pogryz-kartoshku-4941

The main pests of vegetables and potatoes

cruciferous fleas- small (0.2-0.3 cm) jumping bugs of dark green color or black with yellow stripes. They harm young shoots of cabbage, radish, radish, beets and other crops by gnawing out the flesh of the leaf.

Fleas are especially dangerous in dry, hot weather, when they harm even cabbage seedlings planted in the ground. Flea-damaged leaves have many holes and soon dry out.

To combat fleas, you can pollinate crops with pyrethrum (10-25 g per 10 sq. M), sprinkle plants and earth with ash or tobacco dust mixed with an equal amount of lime. For 10 sq. m of sowing requires 100-150 g of the mixture.

Dusting is best done early in the morning, by dew, repeating it 2-3 times at intervals of 7-10 days - until the flea disappears. You can also use glue flags - a piece of material attached to a stick, impregnated with some kind of adhesive. Such a flag is driven over the plants, and the fleas, jumping, stick to it.

It is necessary to remove weeds from the garden, as they are the initial shelter of the flea, in the fall to deeply cultivate the soil, to sow early.

Attention!

turnip white- a large diurnal butterfly. The wings are white with a yellowish tinge, especially on the underside. The top of the front wings is darkened. The male has one black spot on the wing, the female has two black spots. Hindwings with one black spot at the anterior margin. Wingspan - 4-5.5 cm.

In the last decade of May, the butterfly starts laying eggs, placing them one by one on the lower and upper sides of the leaves of cabbage, radish and other cruciferous. The eggs are yellow.

One female lays 150 or more eggs. After 7-11 days, caterpillars are born from them. Their body is velvety green in color with thin yellow stripes on the sides, the size is 2-2.5 cm. The caterpillars eat away the leaf tissue, first making a window, and then through holes.

Caterpillars of older ages gnaw the leaves completely, leaving the veins intact. In summer, they often burrow between the leaves covering the heads of cabbage, causing it to rot. The turnip white causes the greatest harm to cabbage, other cruciferous ones are damaged by it to a lesser extent.

The first generation of caterpillars is slightly harmful in June, the second and third generations are especially harmful - from the end of August to the end of September. The turnip whitefish overwinters in the pupal stage on the stems of weeds, in stalks, on fences, dry branches, etc.

The easiest way to deal with turnip whitefish in small areas is to systematically inspect plant leaves and crush eggs, and later collect and destroy caterpillars. Collect them in a bucket, pouring a little saline there.

If there is a need to use poisons, it is recommended that when caterpillars appear, spray the plants with biological products or a solution of karbofos (20-30 g per 10 l of water). It is possible to process cabbage with poisons only until a head is formed.

You can spray the plants with a decoction of tomato tops. The broth is prepared as follows: 3.5 kg of tops (leaves, stepchildren, stems and even green fruits) are finely cut, poured with ten liters of boiling water and left for 10 days.

Then the contents are well rubbed and filtered through gauze. 2 liters of infusion are diluted in 10 liters of water and 40 g of green or laundry soap. The solution is prepared on the day of use. Tops of tomatoes can be prepared for future use by drying it in the fall.

An infusion of the stems and leaves of the delphinium is also used. To do this, one part of the green mass is poured into 10 parts cold water, insist two days, filter, add 40 g of soap and use for spraying plants.

You can also spray the plants with a solution of sodium chloride (400 g per 10 liters of water), sprinkle with tobacco dust with ash or fluffy lime.

In the autumn, after harvesting the cabbage, it is necessary to dig up the area to the entire depth of the arable layer, and also remove all the remnants from the garden - fallen leaves, stumps, etc. In this way, a large number of pupated caterpillars wintering in the ground, on fallen leaves, in stumps, are destroyed .

cabbage scoop- a moth of a brownish-grayish color. The wingspan is 4-4.5 cm, on the front wings there are dark transverse stripes and two spots at the front edge.

Along the outer edge of the front wings there is a light wavy line. The eggs are grayish-gray, hemispherical in shape, with longitudinal ribs. The caterpillar is green at a young age, the adult caterpillar is thick, brownish-green, up to 5 cm long. The pupa is dark brown, smooth, shiny.

The cabbage scoop is distributed throughout the Far East and belongs to the most dangerous pests of cabbage, it also damages beets, lettuce, peas, onions and other plants. Butterflies fly out of the overwintered pupae at the beginning of summer, which lay eggs on the underside of the leaves, in groups of 30-50 pieces.

One female lays an average of 600-700 eggs, and in total she can lay up to 2000. Freshly laid eggs are almost white, then darken. After 5-12 days, caterpillars emerge from the eggs. At first they live in groups on the underside of the leaves, and then they spread out and during this period they feed at night, and during the day they usually hide among the leaves or under clods of earth.

In autumn, the caterpillars bite into the head of the head, making moves, and pollute it with their feces, which causes the heads to rot. To pupate, the caterpillars go into the ground. Harms in July the first generation of caterpillars (early cabbage), in late August - September - the second generation (late cabbage). Pupae of the second generation hibernate.

The control measures are the same as against the turnip white, but spraying and dusting must be carried out until the caterpillars are young and have not gone inside the heads of cabbage. Since the wintering of the pest takes place in the ground, in order to destroy the wintering pupae, it is necessary to dig deep (plow) the site in the fall, and then harrow it.

Gnawing scoops- caterpillars of night butterflies. During the day they are in the ground, and at dusk and at night they crawl out to the surface and gnaw the stems and petioles of leaves in young plants, and in adults they damage the leaves, make holes in them.

Gnawing scoops in the Far East greatly harm the majority vegetable crops, especially cabbage, tomatoes and beets in June - July. They also severely damage young shoots of potatoes, gnawing them. stems.

Fighting scoops is difficult, as they lead a hidden (underground) lifestyle. Caterpillars can be dug up and destroyed in the morning by carefully tearing up the ground around the damaged plant. It is also necessary to dig up the garden in the fall, while a significant part of the wintering caterpillars die.

cabbage moth damages cabbage leaves, eating small holes in them from the underside and leaving the upper skin intact. With the mass appearance of caterpillars, cabbage leaves turn white. Butterfly small, flies in the evening; caterpillars are small (0.9-1.2 cm), bright green, with a black head, small black dots and sparse black hairs all over the body.

In young plants, caterpillars eat the growing point and leaves. In damaged plants, heads are not tied up or remain loose, underdeveloped. Caterpillars hibernate in post-harvest residues, weeds. Over the summer, up to three generations of cabbage moths develop.

Control measures are the same as against cabbage caterpillars. It is necessary to start the fight against cabbage moth immediately after the first signs of damage appear and finish by the beginning of the formation of a head of cabbage. When processing, you need to ensure that the poison gets to the whole plant. Biological preparations are effective against cabbage moth.

Attention!

cabbage fly resembles a room, but somewhat smaller. Lays eggs on the ground near the stem of cabbage seedlings or on the lower part of the stem. After 5-8 days, white worm-like larvae emerge from the testicles, which settle on the roots of plants, gnaw them from the outside, and climb inside. Damaged roots rot, the stem wilts, and the plants die. During the season, the fly gives two or three generations.

Cabbage fly larvae also damage radishes by making holes in root crops. The cabbage fly causes especially great harm in the northern regions of the region.

To scare away flies, sprinkle the ground around the plants with naphthalene mixed with sand (1 part of naphthalene to 5-8 parts of sand) or a mixture of equal parts of tobacco dust and lime. You can sprinkle with fluffy lime with creolin (20:1) or pyrethrum.

The simplest way to destroy the eggs of a cabbage fly is to rake the earth, along with the testicles from the plant to the middle of the aisle and add fresh earth to the bush from the row. This operation must be repeated 2-2 times every 5-6 days.

Early planting of seedlings and high hilling reduces damage by cabbage fly larvae. A preventive measure of control is the removal and destruction of stumps.

Variegated, or northern, cabbage bug. Insects with a short elongated body (8-11 mm), greenish-bronze in color, with six greenish-black spots, a red stripe along the edge and the same two transverse spots. Larvae are smaller, wingless, brightly colored.

In mid-May, adult bugs emerge from their wintering grounds (from under fallen leaves, moss on the edges of bushes). At first, they feed on wild-growing cruciferous plants, and after planting seedlings of cabbage, they damage its leaves by sucking out juices. As a result, discolored spots form on the leaves.

In mass quantities, bedbugs and their larvae appear in July - August. During this period, they damage the seed plants of radish, cabbage and other cruciferous crops, sucking the juices from the leaves and stems. In damaged plants, weakened flowering, poor development of pods, and frailty of seeds are observed.

Control measures. If a pest is found, spraying with a solution of karbofos (10-30 g per 10 l of water) is carried out. Treatment of plants with pesticides must be stopped 30 days before harvest.

springtail vegetable- small (1-2 mm) brownish-gray insects, equipped with a fork-shaped process at the end of the abdomen, with which they can jump. The springtail causes the most severe damage to seedlings of cucumbers and onion seedlings, and also damages seedlings of pepper, eggplant, table beet.

Springtails gnaw out cotyledons and leaves of cucumbers with round pits, a. sautéed on onion leaves irregular shape elongated holes. Cucumber cotyledons are often completely destroyed, and on onions, the tips of the leaves turn yellow, curl up and dry.

Springtails are especially active on sunny, calm days, and in cloudy weather, when strong wind hiding under clods of earth.

To control pests, seedlings and the ground around them should be pollinated with ashes. It is necessary to strive to create the most favorable conditions for the development of plants during this critical period, since usually, with the appearance of true leaves, the harmfulness of these insects no longer poses a danger.

Aphid- small insects (midges) of a greenish or dark brown color. Different kinds aphids damage whole line vegetable plants sucking the juices out of them. Aphids cause the greatest harm to cabbage and cucumbers, and also harm melon, watermelon, pumpkin and peas. Damaged leaves curl and gradually dry out, plants lag behind in growth and take on an ugly dwarf shape.

Later, the aphid settles on the flowers and ovaries of gourds. With the mass reproduction of aphids, flowers and fruits fall off, and new ones are not tied. The largest number of aphids appears in June - July. It is especially abundant in dry years.

To destroy the pest, you need to spray the plants with a solution of soap (200-300 g of soap per 10 liters of water) or tobacco decoction with soap (500 g of tobacco dust and 100 g of soap per 10 liters of water), as well as a solution of karbofos (10-30 g per 10 l of water). You can treat the plants with an infusion of garlic.

To do this, 150-200 g of garlic are ground in a meat grinder and stirred in 10 liters of water. The solution is used immediately. You can also use a decoction of ash. Sifted ash in the amount of 300 g is boiled in a small amount of water for 20 minutes, then filtered, the total volume of water is brought to 10 l and 30 g of laundry soap are added.

The fight against aphids should begin at the first sign of the appearance of a pest. Treat the underside of the leaves. It is necessary to remove weeds, stumps and other plant residues from the garden after harvesting.

onion fly resembles a housefly in appearance. Lays eggs (in groups of 5 to 20 pieces) between the leaves of the beetle, on dry scales or on the ground near the neck of the bulb. After 7-10 days, the testicles, whitish larvae come out, which penetrate the bulb and destroy it.

In damaged plants, the leaves wither and turn yellow, the bulb rots. During the summer there are two generations of flies - at the end of May. and late July - early August. Damage sometimes reaches 50-80%. The most dangerous is the first generation.

To combat this dangerous onion pest, it is recommended to sow seeds and plant seedlings or seedlings as soon as possible. During the flight, flies use repellents. Along the rows of onions and garlic, they sprinkle with tobacco dust, pyrethrum, ash, peat or naphthalene, mixing it with the same amount of sand.

You can also sprinkle sawdust soaked with creolin in the rows, or rake the testicles from the plants. It is necessary to remove plants affected by larvae from the garden and destroy them, as well as carefully remove all post-harvest residues.

Plants are also watered with a solution of table salt (a glass of salt per 10 liters of water). In this case, you need to ensure that the solution does not fall on the leaves. The first time is watered when the leaves reach 5 cm, then every 20 days.

It is useful to place onion beds nearby and. carrots. The specific smell of carrots repels the onion fly, and onion phytoncides - the carrot fly.

tubercle hoverfly often harms onion and garlic crops along with the onion fly. The larvae are yellowish-gray, with a characteristic red-brown outgrowth at the posterior end. The larvae penetrate the bulb and eat it out.

The bulbs rot and become unusable. Deals damage no less serious than an onion fly. The control measures are the same as with the onion fly.

Wireworms are yellowish larvae of click beetles living in the ground, with a hard, elongated body resembling a piece of wire. They gnaw the stems of many crops and make moves in potato tubers, as well as in the root crops of carrots, beets, foreheads and other crops (especially in young ones).

They live in the soil for 3 to 4 years. In the middle of summer, the larvae pupate, and after 15-20 days, young beetles appear, which remain in the soil for the winter.

Attention!

To combat wireworms, baits from potatoes, carrots, and beets are used; they are cut into pieces and buried in the soil to a depth of 5 cm, marking the places with sticks. Every 2-3 days, wireworms that have bitten into the bait are selected and destroyed. Wireworms are well caught on bait crops of cereal crops: oats, barley, corn.

These crops are sown in early spring before planting (sowing) or between rows during the growing season of vegetables and potatoes. Young plants of bait crops are dug up with lumps of earth and the larvae are selected. The wireworm breeds well on acidic soils, so they should be limed.

Potato 28-spotted cow (epilyahna)- zhukh round-oval convex shape, 5-7 mm long, brownish-red color; both elytra have 28 black spots. At the end of June, females lay pale yellow elongated eggs in bunches on the lower surface of the leaves.

The larva is yellow-green, covered with black branched bristle processes. Per last years a significant distribution of this pest in vegetable gardens was noted.

Damage is caused by both the beetle and the larva, which infect potatoes, tomatoes, eggplants, cucumbers, melons, watermelons and other crops. The greatest harm is done to potatoes. The larvae eat away the flesh of the leaves, leaving the veins intact, they skeletonize the leaves. From the second decade of August, a new generation of these pests appears. Ladybug larvae are almost always found on the underside of leaves.

To combat the cow, the plants are sprayed with a solution of the biopreparation bitoxibacillin or hellebore decoction. The first treatment is carried out when beetles appear, the second - against hatching larvae (end of the second decade of June - beginning of July), the third - against young beetles (end of July - beginning of August).

Beetles and larvae should also be collected by hand, shaking them into scoops and catching them with nets. To destroy the caught insects, they are poured into buckets or jars, at the bottom of which there is a layer of water and kerosene.

Medvedka eastern- a large winged insect of brown-brown color. The front legs end in large teeth, with which the bear digs the soil, and gnaws through the plants with horny jaws.

Medvedka is very prolific, she lays in May from 200 to 400 eggs, from which larvae hatch after one to two weeks. Thanks to well-developed wings, it is able to fly a considerable distance.

Medvedki prefer wet areas. Especially a lot of them accumulate on humus-rich lands. Pests lead a hidden lifestyle, they are in the soil during the day, and come to the surface at night.

Adult bears and their larvae overwinter in the soil or manure. Medvedki damage all vegetable crops, not only in open ground, but also in greenhouses. In the spring, they leave their wintering grounds, make passages in the soil, eat the sown seeds, gnaw the roots and the underground part of the stems, causing the death of plants.

Deep holes are gnawed on root crops and tubers. The greatest damage is observed in the first half of summer, especially in low, damp areas. Harm is caused by adult insects and their larvae.

The most simple and affordable way fight against the bear - the device of hunting pits. In autumn, in places where pests accumulate, they dig a pit of arbitrary length, 50 cm wide and 30 cm deep. Heated manure is placed in the pit.

Medvedki willingly climb there for the winter. With the onset of frost, manure is thrown out of the pit, and insects die from low temperatures. In order to destroy the nests and passages of the bear, in the fall the site is dug up to the full depth of the arable layer.

If in the fall the trapping pits did not suit, then in the spring they lay out small bait heaps of manure (preferably fresh). Medvedki willingly crawl there to lay eggs. After 25-30 days, the heaps are looked through, the bear and eggs are burned.

The following are recommended as repellents: a) wet sand (one bucket) with 0.5 liters of kerosene and scatter it in places where the bear is concentrated; b) moisten sawdust (one bucket) with creolin and scatter in places where the pest accumulates; c) sprinkle the ground around the plants with mothballs several times.

You can catch the pest with the help of beams, on the bottom of which vegetable oil is poured, with a layer of 1 cm. Banks are dug into the ground a little below the surface and somewhat deeper or at the level of the bear. From above they are covered with a cardboard or wooden lid. Attracted by the smell of oil, the bears fall into the jars and die.

In the fight against Medvedka, such a popular, easily accessible method is also used. They buy small fish (sprat, sprat, etc.) - pickled, spicy salted or fresh and even spoiled. They tear it into halves and lay it in the holes during the planting of seedlings to a depth of 3-4 cm in the form of a triangle.

On the ridges, fish carcasses are laid out between the planting rows at the same depth. It has been established that the bear does not enter either the ridges or the holes where the fish is laid out, the seeds and plants remain intact.

It is noted that the bear does not live in soil fertilized with chicken manure, does not like the smell of garlic, marigold flowers scare it away.

As a preventive measure that prevents the appearance and accumulation of a bear, drainage reclamation is of great importance - the construction of drainage ditches for the outflow of excess moisture, maintaining high ridges and ridges during the summer.

source: https://kartoha.com.ua/49/

Garden without pests

Medvedka is a small brown insect, its body length reaches 5 cm. It has shortened elytra, well-developed limbs.

Medvedka

It is distributed in many CIS countries, but most of all in the central and southern regions of Russia and Ukraine, as well as in the damp and warm regions of Moldova and Belarus. If there are no abundantly manured areas, the bear moves to greenhouses, closer to vegetable crops. She eats everything: cabbage, beets, carrots, onions, tomatoes, cucumbers, potatoes and eggplants.

Moving in the soil thanks to powerful limbs, the bear destroys the roots, stems, seeds of plants, bringing vegetable growers to despair. Adult females lay in the soil, at a depth of 10–15 cm, large, up to 2.5 mm, eggs.

Up to 400–440 eggs are placed in one nest, of which, after one or two decades, bright, voracious larvae appear, representing a very great danger to the garden.

Control measures You should not buy manure from random suppliers to fertilize the site. If the bears did appear, you must first try to destroy them without pesticides.

There is a simple and ecologically harmless way: you need to make traps from half-decomposed manure into which bears willingly climb. There they are easy to collect and destroy.

Chemical methods are based on the laying out of poisoned baits, which should be purchased only in specialized stores. Read the instructions carefully. When using new baits, remember to embed them in the soil so that poisons do not fall into the field of view of children, birds and pets.

Do not abuse toxic drugs such as zinc phosphide mixed with boiled corn or barley grains. Such poisons accumulate in the soil and then pass into the roots, tubers and other plant organs that we feed on.

lamellar beetles

Lamellar beetles are divided into several harmful species, among which the most dangerous are lamellar bronzes, May beetles, and June beetles. Bronzovki eat inflorescences and flowers of cabbage and other cruciferous, as well as buds of flowering onions.

May beetle and June beetle damage root crops and roots. The Maybug has reddish-brown elytra with a black border around the edges. The length of the body, together with the chitinous cover, is from 22 to 30 mm. Beetles overwinter in the soil. They fly out in early May, in warm springs at the end of April.

It is difficult to interrupt the development cycle of this beetle, because the females lay their eggs in the soil to a depth of at least 10 cm. After a month, white thick larvae appear from yellowish-white eggs. Their yellow heads stand out sharply against the background of the arched body. It takes 3 to 5 years for the Maybug to complete its full development cycle.

Attention!

Voracious larvae cause great harm to crops, eating large cavities in potato tubers, beet root crops and gnawing root system many plants. Pupation of larvae occurs in July at a depth of about 30 cm. The pupae are easy to detect by two noticeable outgrowths at the end of the corpus luteum. By autumn, beetles appear from them.

Control measures. In case of mass reproduction of the May beetle, plants should be sprayed with Inta-Vir (1 tablet per 10 liters of water). In the morning, when the beetles are inactive, they are shaken off on a film or burlap.

For 1 weave, 8 holes are dug 50 x 50 x 30 cm in size and the concentration of larvae is counted. If the average number is more than 1 larvae per 1 m2 of plot, it is necessary both in autumn and spring to dig deep into the soil and manually collect all the larvae.

snails

The harmfulness of snails does not appear outwardly. But with their tiny chitinous teeth, they gnaw through the entire leaf integumentary parenchymal tissue.

Snails feed on fruits and even mushrooms. The eggs are laid in the soil. Snails overwinter, burrowing into the ground, from where they emerge in the spring. On hot summer days, they completely cover the hole in the mink with mucus and can be in a state of hibernation for a long time.

Places of distribution of snails are waterlogged berry and garden plantations. Not all types of snails are equally harmful. Amber, hairy and forest snails are more harmless than grape snails, which eat not only grapes, but also cabbage, beets and other succulent garden plants.

Control measures. With the mass distribution of snails are collected by hand. This should be done early in the morning or in the evening before dusk, as snails avoid direct sunlight. On hot days, collecting snails is difficult.

Colorado beetle

This polyphagous pest was once brought to Russia from America, or rather, from the potato fields of Colorado. Hence the name of the beetle.

The beetle does not disguise itself as the color of the plant, its chitinous cover is bright in color. This pest reaches a length of 10–12 mm. Spraying beetles are not afraid - they multiply at a tremendous speed.

The back and elytra are yellowish-red or bright yellow, on the underwings there are 5 black longitudinal stripes, and on the front part black spots stand out in relief. For the winter, beetles climb deep into the soil: 20–50 cm is the usual depth to which pests descend.

As soon as the soil temperature rises to 25 ° C, the beetles get out of their hiding places and begin to eat any plants of the nightshade family, even wild nightshade, poisonous dope and henbane. The beetle is very dangerous for potatoes, which have juicy tender sprouts. Beetles are quite mobile: they are able to fly long distances in search of food.

This beetle also penetrates greenhouses with tomatoes, it is attracted by their strong specific smell. Eating the leaves, the beetles gain strength, and the females begin to lay eggs on intact leaf blades from the underside. The eggs are yellow at first and then turn red. Their length is 1–2 mm, the shape is elongated-oval, the surface is smooth and shiny, each clutch contains several dozen eggs.

Voracious larvae from one such masonry are able to completely destroy the leaves of 1 plant, whether it be a tomato, nightshade or another representative of this family. During the summer in hot countries, up to 4 generations of the Colorado potato beetle may appear in one garden bed, if its reproduction is not prevented.

For 2 decades, the larvae completely destroy the foliage of potatoes, only bare stems remain above the ground. Having eaten one plant, the larvae crawl to the next one. By this time, they grow, reaching a length of 1.5 mm, their color is orange-red, the body is divided into segments covered with black spots, on each segment, as a rule, 3 spots.

The pupa also acquires this color, but it is slightly smaller than the larva. The pupa develops after the satiated larvae crawl from the almost destroyed plant and pupate in the ground. 1-2 weeks pass, and a new generation of young beetles is born.

Control measures. Control measures should be both preventive and protective, aimed at defeating the beetle. The beetle appears where potatoes grow. Most summer residents grow early potatoes. It is impossible for the most dangerous pest to gain strength on potato tops. Potatoes should not be planted in the same place where they were planted the previous time.

If a week before harvesting potatoes, you have time to mow all of its above-ground part, then you can deprive the beetle of food, and it will leave the site. Of course, the beetle will not die of hunger, but it will go to neighboring areas. Some individuals may remain in the garden if the beveled tops are folded into large non-drying heaps. There, the beetles will find green foliage to sustain life. Therefore, everything possible must be done to leave the beetle without food.

When harvesting potatoes, do not leave tubers in the ground. After harvesting, it is imperative to dig or plow the soil so that the beetles that have hidden for the winter are on the surface of the soil, then frost will destroy them.

Soil cultivation should be carried out in the summer, when pupation occurs between the rows. Such digging at a shallow depth will partially help destroy the pupae in the ground.

You should not often use chemical methods of control: pesticides act not only on beetles. If there are few pests, at first you can limit yourself to manual collection in small containers with strong aqueous solution regular salt. Potato tubers are partially protected from direct exposure to chemicals by a layer of earth, unlike tomatoes, physalis, peppers and other nightshade crops, which use aerial organs for food.

The latter must be treated with the least toxic substances, for example, bitoxibacillin, which is dissolved in water at 40–100 g per bucket of water. This is a biological preparation that destroys the larvae after 3-fold treatment with a weekly interval.

3 weeks before harvesting, plants can be sprayed with Inta-Vir. A bucket of water will require 1 insecticide tablet. Potato plantings are treated with many insecticides: sonnet or biorin - 10 g per 10 l of water, bifetrin - 35 g per 10 l of water, phenaksin - 100 g per 10 l of water, fury - 0.7 ml per 10 l of water, sumi-alpha - 5 g per 10 l of water, rovikurt - 10 g per 10 l, decis - 2 ml per 10 l of water.

Short-eared owl

Sometimes it is called potato, but this is not entirely true, since it also feeds on tomato, corn and other plants. Caterpillars near the ground gnaw passages in the stems of crops and eat away the contents, making passages in the core, after which the plants dry up and die, and even wet weather does not save the damaged stem from dying off and progressive rot.

In the Nechernozemie and central Russia, the introduction of caterpillars usually begins in June, immediately after planting tomatoes in open ground. Caterpillars pupate in the soil next to plants at the end of July.

Attention!

The swamp scoop lives, regardless of the presence of swamps, in many CIS countries, causing enormous damage to plantings of cultivated plants, as it multiplies very quickly if measures are not taken to destroy it. The difficulty of fighting the scoop lies also in the fact that its caterpillars, having climbed into the core of the stems, are perfectly protected from pesticides that do not fall on pests during spraying.

Butterflies can also lay their eggs on wild grasses. Scoops stand out against a green plant background with red or dark pink wings with a span of up to 3.5–3.8 mm. On the edge of the front wings, you can find a clear border of gray, which extends to the entire surface of the hind wings of this cutworm.

From eggs laid on cultivated and wild grasses, large, long (up to 4 cm) caterpillars with black warts and bristles appear, the head has the color of fresh blood, the body is dotted with stripes of the same color.

Control measures. Hilling tomatoes after planting prevents the penetration of caterpillars into the stems. A positive effect is the application of mineral fertilizers in the summer.

Damaged plants are removed along with the root system and burned. If the swamp scoop has multiplied strongly, spraying with chemicals is carried out. The dosage and set of them is the same as for the fight against the Colorado potato beetle.

Nightshade, or potato, flea

Outside the protected ground, in the open air, the flea can seriously damage the plantings of tomatoes, peppers, eggplants and potatoes. It damages the foliage, on which numerous holes appear, as the flea eats away the soft tissues of the leaf blades, leading to wilting and inevitable death of the plant.

The size of this insect is about 3 mm. It has dark brown limbs and elytra, the main color of the beetle is black. The pest does a lot of harm at a young age. The beetle does not get into greenhouses, greenhouses, film shelters. The nightshade flea has received the greatest distribution in the European part of the CIS countries and in Western Siberia.

Like most dangerous pests of the nightshade family, the flea spends the winter in the soil, escaping in the upper layer from sharp fluctuations in low temperatures. In early May, the beetles usually wake up and come to the surface. Unlike many cutworms, beetles do not need green plants to lay their eggs.

Usually laying eggs occurs under a well-heated lump of earth. Eggs are yellow, oblong-oval, 0.6 mm long. They are easy to spot with the naked eye on the ground. The larvae of the potato flea colonize the root system of nightshade plants. The shape of the larvae is elongated, the adult larva has 3 pairs of limbs. For active pupation, well-warmed soil is needed.

Control measures. The flea is harmed by excessive soil moisture, therefore, when planting, it is necessary to water the plants more often. Dusting plantings with a mixture of tobacco dust, lime and ash is recommended to be carried out in individual areas. Dusting should be stopped 3 weeks before harvest.

wireworms

This is one of the most dangerous species pests. Particularly harmful are dark, striped, sowing, black, shiny, wide and steppe wireworms, united by the common name - click beetles. Beetles damage roots, root crops, tubers and root collars. The larvae damage the cabbage, their bodies are worm-like, the chitinous cover is dense.

The length of the larvae ranges from 15 to 25 mm. Adult individuals live in the soil near damaged plants (cabbage, carrots, cucumbers, onions, beets, tomatoes). Watermelons, pumpkins, melons, as well as the seeds of most vegetable crops are very much at risk.

The development of click beetles proceeds extremely slowly, as a rule, it takes 3–4 years until the pupation period begins. This process occurs in the soil at a depth of 14–16 cm, usually closer to the middle of summer, when temperature regime may be considered ideal for them.

The pupae turn into beetles in half a month. Young beetles crawl in the soil in a vertical direction. Excess moisture and cold make them burrow deeper, and with the onset of warming they rise again.

The wireworms themselves are small, their bodies are slightly longer than 1 cm, the color is brown, bluish, or black. Clickers got their name because of the clicks that are heard when the beetle, having fallen on its back, jumps up sharply, making a sharp clicking sound.

Control measures. Beetles are afraid of lime, alkaline fertilizers. Very effective liming spring application in the soil of ammonium sulfate, ammonium nitrate. Deep plowing and frequent loosening are applicable. If the generation of wireworms is too numerous, then it is necessary to plant crops that are inedible for beetles.

You can treat the seeds with a suspension of 65% s. fentiuram or fentiuram-molybdate 4 g per 1 kg of seeds, which will scare away click beetles not only from seeds in the soil, but also from seedlings of many vegetable plants on the site.

​Related Articles​

• In early spring, when the bear is already looking for food for itself, and nothing is growing in the garden yet, I feed it with a special “treat”. I soak pieces of stale bread in this mixture: for 1 liter of water I add 1 package or ampoule
• Every year I sow matthiola on a potato plot or around the perimeter of a garden. The smell of its lilac-pink fragrant flowers repels the pest.
• Caterpillars damage plants and tubers. During the growing season, they bore into leaves (less often - into stems and tubers) and lay eggs. In storage, eggs are laid on the eyes of tubers.

- in spring and autumn, dig deep into the soil in places where organic fertilizers are stored and in greenhouses, while collecting larvae and adults of the bear;

Autumn digging of the soil, which contributes to the entry of wireworms into its upper layers and their death during the winter.

Thus, over the course of 16 years, the K. beetle moved in masses over a distance of 3000 in. In France and Germany, the importation from America of potatoes, sacks from under it, etc., was prohibited; despite the fact that the K. beetle still made its way to Europe. In Russia, the K. beetle has not yet appeared. In all interested states of Europe, tables were published depicting the various stages of development of the K. beetle with a popular description of its lifestyle; these tables were distributed everywhere free of charge among the population, so that everyone could recognize the beetle if it appeared and immediately report about it in order to take timely energetic measures to exterminate it.

If only one small source of infection is detected, the affected plants must be dug up and burned. Only such radical measures can stop the nematode and prevent the death of all plants on the site. The inventory is treated with formalin, the same can be done with the soles of work shoes.​

You can cultivate the field no more than twice in one season, otherwise the crop itself may suffer.

Laundry soap mixed with wood ash. A bar of ordinary laundry soap is dissolved in a bucket of water, two cans of ash are added there. After that, a liter of such a product is diluted with a bucket of water and the plants are sprayed. After 1-2 dressings, insects will completely disappear from potato bushes.

Undoubtedly, this is the most dangerous pest available. Distributed almost throughout Russia. Potato beetles themselves almost do not damage. All harm comes from their larvae. So, how to deal with this pest.

Vofatox, 1 packet of any insecticide and 2-3 tsp. vegetable oil. Then I dip the bread into each hole along with the potato tubers. Saved the harvest!

I put 3-4 unsalted capelin on a plastic bag and leave it on a potato plot, lightly sprinkled with soil. Every morning I check the baits, which regularly gather bugs.

Born caterpillars make moves in them. Various microorganisms penetrate into damaged tissues, causing the development of dry and wet rot.

- review carefully organic fertilizers before applying them to the soil;

Liming of acidic soils is necessary. A neutral or slightly alkaline environment is unfavorable for the wireworm, however, it contributes to an increase in the damage to tubers by common scab. Soil acidity can be reduced by adding wood ash.

In America, the K. beetle and its larvae are destroyed by dousing them in potato fields with a mixture of Scheinfurt green powder (arsenic copper) and water using a special machine. This poisonous powder, however, is also dangerous for workers.​ If a focus of infection is identified, after harvesting, potato tubers are thoroughly washed from the ground. It is undesirable to sell them or transport them to another place, it is better to leave such potatoes for your own use. All tops are burned, and the field must be thoroughly cleaned even of small tubers.

1. In addition, it is advisable to alternate plants on the site. The scoop caterpillar most often chooses nightshade: eggplant, tomatoes, potatoes, and it is better to periodically plant other crops in their place. It is important to carry out complex processing using several methods, only then you can get the result.​
2. The use of calendula The Colorado potato beetle does not like the smell of calendula, so it is enough to plant it around the field so that the pests do not approach it. You can also plant several plants between the rows of potatoes in the field.​
3. colorado beetle,

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The most effective potato pest control methods

​Lyudmila POMPA, Mariupol​

Striped pests do not like spraying 2 times a week with this composition: I dilute 300 g of baking soda and yeast in 10 liters of water.

- lay in the soil to a depth of 2-3 cm, boiled in salted water, watered sunflower oil and insecticide-treated cereal grains. Periodically look through the poisoned baits and destroy the centers of the bear;

Bait may be used. Before planting potatoes or at any other time, food baits (sliced ​​potatoes, beets, any cake) are placed in the soil to a depth of 5-15 cm. Pieces of solid bait are strung on a fishing line, to the ends of which twigs or sticks are attached. After 3-4 days, fishing lines with baits and wireworms are removed from the soil and destroyed.

Potato disease caused by the potato nematode Globodera rostochiensis. A quarantine disease common in all areas of potato growing.​

• It will not be possible to grow nightshade crops in the contaminated area for a long time. It is recommended to plant legumes or vegetables in this place that the nematode does not touch for at least two to three years, and only then it will be possible to grow potatoes again. But even in this case, it is better to choose varieties that are resistant to the action of the pest.
• Medvedka is a common, but little-studied pest of a rather frightening look. It is sometimes called the "mole cricket", as it is able to move quickly in the ground, while it makes sounds similar to the singing of a cricket.
• Wormwood to combat the Colorado potato beetle. It is necessary to collect about a third of a bucket of wormwood, pour it with boiling water, insist, and after a few days it will be possible to spray the infected areas of the field with the infusion.

Use special chemicals for spraying.

wireworm,

• To resist the pest, and at the same time get a good potato harvest, I developed the following potato "rules" for myself.
• Also, the Colorado potato beetle does not tolerate the smell of turpentine or fir oil (for spraying - 1 tablespoon / 10 liters of water).
• These insects cause significant harm in some years, mainly in low, moist areas. The harmfulness of scoops is high, damaged stems can account for 20-30% of the total. The stems wither and dry out or break in places damaged by caterpillars.
• - in the fall, after harvesting, dig holes 40-50 cm deep and put manure (preferably horse manure) in them, and when frost sets in, periodically look through the traps, destroying the pest;
• Also, in the aisles of potatoes, corn, oats, wheat or barley are sown - 4-5 grains per nest at a distance of 50-70 cm or in a row. Then the seedlings of these crops are dug up with a clod of soil and wireworms gathered in it. It is recommended to sow lettuce between rows, the roots of which feed on wireworms. When the lettuce plants begin to wilt, they should be dug up and the larvae that have accumulated around the roots should be collected. You can use shading traps from freshly weeded weeds or any other grass under which the pest accumulates.

In Belarus, globoderosis is especially harmful in household plots with a permanent potato crop. With severe damage to plants, yield losses can be 85-100%.​

There are many resistant varieties now: they include Zhukovsky early, Almaz, Platina, Sappho and many others. In the roots of such plants, substances are formed that are resistant to the effects of larvae: if they do not receive nutrition, they either die or are underdeveloped, not becoming adults. As a result, it is possible not only to save this crop, but also in the future to prevent the development of the potato nematode in our own and neighboring areas.

For potatoes, it poses a serious danger, since the bear gnaws on tubers and roots and can completely ruin the crop.

There are other recipes, for example, some gardeners recommend using red pepper to fight. However, not all methods are safe for plants, so care must be taken. The main requirement is that the treatment must be comprehensive and regular, only then it will be possible to obtain the desired result.​

• Don't forget about manual collection and the destruction of beetles and their larvae.
• Bear.
• Weed out weeds, especially wheatgrass.
• Alena AGEEVA, Penza

Control measures: A set of preventive and destructive measures is used to protect potatoes from intrastem scoops. Of the chemical agents for combating caterpillars, you can use, for example, decis, cymbush.

- destroy nests and horizontal caves in the habitats of insects, loosen row spacings twice in May-June to a depth of 10-20 cm.

It is necessary to place potatoes after beans or peas.

• It affects the root system of potatoes. External signs of the disease are manifested in stunted growth and development of plants, thinning of the stem and roots, crushing and deformation of the leaves. The root system takes on a fibrous ("bearded") appearance.
• Pest control has to be constantly dealt with by every gardener: insects and their larvae are capable of destroying 90% of the crop in one year, and if they are not stopped, the work will be in vain.

Medvedka prefers open places where the soil is well warmed by the sun. To remove the shadow over her hole, she is able to completely destroy the plants that block the sunlight. It is quite difficult to deal with it, but comprehensive measures allow you to get a good result.​

Another common and very dangerous pest is the wireworm. It is the larvae of the click beetle, which literally make holes in the shoots and tubers. If measures are not taken in time, the wireworm will capture the entire field and can destroy up to half of the entire crop.

You can make your own poison. Pour a solution of karbofos into a bucket with potato peelings in the ratio of 2 tablespoons of the drug per half liter of water. Moisten these cleanings. When planting potatoes, lay them out in holes (depth - 30 cm). Hungry and overwintered Colorado potato beetles gather in these holes, absorb poison and die.

In this article we will tell you how to deal with them.

Lime the soil (I scatter lime over the surface or add it to the holes when planting).

To scare away the Colorado potato beetle, you can sprinkle birch and spruce sawdust on the bushes and between the rows of potatoes every two weeks. They interrupt the potato smell (especially strongly during the flowering period).

July 2, 2014

• The aerial part of the potato is damaged by scoop caterpillars. Two types of scoops develop in the stems: potato, it is also marsh, or purple spring, and ordinary heart-shaped.
• For the purpose of creating adverse conditions for the reproduction of click beetles and the accumulation of wireworms, ammonium nitrate or ammonium sulfate (20-30 g / m2) should be applied to the soil.
• Sick bushes are found in foci (they are especially easily detected on a sunny day, as they quickly wither). They are stunted, have fewer stems, which become longer and thinner. The root system is poorly developed, secondary roots are formed near the soil surface. The leaves, starting from the bottom, wither, turn yellow and fall off, which leads to premature death of plants. In the case of the formation of tubers, they are small, few (1-3).
• Now there is a huge selection of chemicals designed for the protective treatment of fields, but they are far from always effective. Simple measures, worked out by generations of gardeners, make it possible to obtain excellent results and harvest a perfect crop with minimal costs for protective treatment. It is important to know the vital activity of the pest in order to find the most effective way to fight.
• There are several main methods of dealing with a bear:

There are two options for dealing with this pest - chemical and agrotechnical.

Potato nematode: signs of damage and the fight against it

The number of Colorado potato beetles is very well reduced if the tops are pollinated with clean and sifted wood ash in the morning (ratio: 2 tablespoons per 1 sq. M).

Potato pests: wireworm

Bring in ammonium nitrate, naphthalene for digging.

Cucumber grass (borago) is not only a good honey plant and culinary seasoning. She perfectly repels her smell of the Colorado potato beetle if planted next to the potato rows.

Good results in the fight against the Colorado potato beetle are obtained by 3-4 times the treatment of bushes per season with Inta-Vir, Tanrek, Decis, Commander, Fastak, Fitoverm (according to instructions). And Bankol is generally very strong - adult beetles and young ones die immediately after the first spraying.

These insects cause significant harm in some years, mainly in low, moist areas. The harmfulness of the scoop is high, damaged stems can account for 20-30% of the total.

• Application to the soil before plowing or during planting of potatoes with granular insecticides that you can prepare yourself. For this 5 kg granulated superphosphate spread in a thin layer polyethylene film and sprayed with one of the insecticides (actellik -15 ml, decis - 0.4 ml, karate - 1 ml, fastak - 2 ml, fury - 1 ml, etc.), diluted in a water-acetone solution (800 ml of water + 200 ml acetone).​
• With a weak globerosis lesion, diseased plants are detected only when digging and examining the roots, on which white, yellow or brown nematode cysts are found. Cysts remain in the soil for 8-10 (or more) years.
• ​More information can be found in the video.​

Setting up traps. The pest can be caught quite simple means: these are glass jars that are dug into the ground at ground level in places where insects are most concentrated. Within a day, a solid catch can be found in the bank, and the elimination of even a few pests will reduce the damage caused to crops.​

Insecticide treatments are not always effective, and can damage the plants themselves and poison crops if overused. Knowledge of agricultural technology will not allow the larvae to develop, and thus it will be possible to save most of the crop.

Potato is the most common garden crop, and today it is difficult to imagine anyone without it. country cottage area. However, potatoes are loved not only by gardeners, but also by all kinds of pests, so every gardener should know at least the main list of dangers that await the crop, and measures to combat them. Potatoes are threatened by insects, in addition, you can encounter various larvae, caterpillars, and fungal diseases. Let's look at the most basic serious threats and determine how potato pest control is going.​

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Add to the wells when planting potatoes: ground eggshell; ash (full scoop); onion peel (I used to put two handfuls into the hole, but in windy weather it is inconvenient - the dry peel scatters, so now I soak the tubers before planting in the infusion: I put 3-4 handfuls of the peel into an enameled bucket, fill it with water to the top, bring to a boil and I insist under the lid for 2-3 hours); mustard powder (I also add red hot pepper).

Varvara MANKO, Kiev

The poisonous bait works well - in the spring, soak the slices of potato tubers for a day in a solution of urea or Karbofos. Spread the etched pieces on the site in cloudy weather or at night. Hungry beetles pounce on these slices with appetite, not realizing that they are poisoned, and after a while they die. This method I advise you to repeat in the fall immediately after harvesting.

The stems wither and dry out or break in places damaged by caterpillars. To protect potatoes from intrastem scoops, a set of preventive and destructive measures is used.

The drug obtained in this way is dried in the shade and scattered in a tape method over an area of ​​​​up to 100 m2. The site is immediately plowed up. When planting potatoes under a shovel, 5-7 granules of processed superphosphate are introduced into the hole along with the tuber. Hardwood sawdust can be used instead of superphosphate. 5 kg of sawdust are also scattered in a thin layer on a plastic film and sprayed with a sprayer or watering can with one of the insecticides mentioned above.

Potato or Colorado potato beetle

Transmitted with tubers, soil, agricultural implements, containers. Potato stem nematode

Autumn traps. On the site, you can dig holes and fill them with manure and straw. Insects will climb into the warmth for wintering, and after a while the pits can be emptied by scattering the contents around the site. The larvae will die from the cold, and next year it will be much easier to save the crop.

There are several methods:

The Colorado potato beetle is a pest that gardeners constantly encounter. This is a striped insect about 1 cm long, the larvae have a bright red or pink color.

This is a worm. You can often see how fresh potatoes are literally riddled with back doors. This is the result of the activity of the wireworm. His moves are a real misfortune for the potato! You will not get off with cleaning the tuber. It will be much easier to throw it away! But you can’t send all the potatoes to the trash can! Therefore, urgent action must be taken! Potato pest control is not an easy task, but only for those who do not know how to do it!​

It is advisable to shed the wells when planting with a pink solution of potassium permanganate.

​advice​

Cyst-forming nematode (Globoderosis)

Elena BOYKOVA, Tver

Sexual dimorphism is not expressed. The front wings are narrow, pointed, straight, spanning 40-50 mm. The color varies from yellowish brown to black brown and is sometimes darker along the anterior margin. Outside of the kidney-shaped spot is a black wedge-shaped stroke, against which there are two other black strokes extending from the submarginal line.

Watering the soil before planting tubers with a solution of potassium permanganate (5 g per 10 l of water) 0.5 l per hole or watering the plants under the root, 0.5 l of the same solution per bush. It is necessary to apply the solution only on neutral and alkaline soils.​

This is a heat-loving insect that can develop not only in summer, but also in winter when the storage temperature of potatoes is above 10oC. The moth is most common in tropical and subtropical climates, but in recent years it has also settled where potatoes are grown twice a year.

A very small whitish thread-like worm, about 0.7-1.4 mm long. In the affected tubers, they are on the border of healthy and affected tissue. The first sign of damage to tubers by a stem nematode (hidden form) is the formation of characteristic very small whitish soft loose spots under the skin.

Processing with a decoction of onion peel. Husks and onion waste are poured with boiling water, after which the solution must be left to infuse. After 7 days, it is diluted with water and the area is shed. In general, other pests do not like this solution either, so it has been widely used in agricultural work. Soil cultivation is best done after rain, and if it was not there, the site is first watered with water.

potato moth

Late digging of the soil. The larvae overwinter in the ground after harvest, so you can successfully deal with them, just dig the soil well at the first frost at the end of October. In this case, the larvae will be on the surface and will not survive the cold snap.

This is an extremely dangerous pest: one pair of beetles can give offspring that can destroy more than 4 hectares of plantings, adult insects and larvae literally gnaw the entire vegetative part of plants.

Fight against wireworm

Lay out baits (potatoes and other vegetables to a depth of 5-10 cm), set traps, collect pests manually.

​: From the Colorado potato beetle I use a decoction of tomato tops: pour 500 g of the plant into 10 liters of water and boil for 30 minutes. I cool, filter, restore the volume of liquid to 10 liters, dissolve 40 g of laundry soap in it and spray the potatoes on the leaves.

Having a small plot, I don’t have the opportunity to observe crop rotation, and I grow potatoes (early and mid-ripening varieties) in one place. But, despite this, I still got rid of the Colorado potato beetle.

The hindwings are light grey, with dark veins and a darkened outer margin. Antennae of females are bristle-shaped, those of males are comb-like for 2/3 of their length. The lifespan of adults is 12-33 days. Fertility 500-900 (maximum up to 2000) eggs. Eggs are laid 1 or 2-3 on plant leaves or soil adjacent to the ground. The duration of egg development is from 3-5 days (summer) to 2 weeks (autumn). The egg is oval in shape (0.5-0.6 mm in diameter and 0.4 mm high), the surface is ribbed, the color is first milky white, then dark purple.

wireworms

Watering potatoes with a 3-day infusion of celandine - 100 g of chopped plant mass, nettle - 500 g, dandelion - 200 g, coltsfoot - 200 g in 10 liters of water. Watering is repeated 2-3 times with an interval of 7 days. The pest easily adapts in temperate latitudes. In the field, the mole hibernates in the caterpillar or pupa stage in plant debris or the upper soil layer, in storage - in all stages of development.

This is the breeding ground for nematodes. Later, in such places, the peel dries up, wrinkles and easily lags behind the pulp. Dark brown spots with a characteristic metallic sheen are formed on the tubers. They gradually increase, the peel under them exfoliates from the pulp and cracks if severely damaged. The largest number of spots near the umbilical cord.

Fertilizer with chicken manure. This is an effective method, since the bear does not live in fertilized soil. 2 kg of manure is dissolved in 10 liters of water, the concentration should not be exceeded. After that, you need to dilute the solution in a ratio of 1: 5, and then dry land is spilled on the site. This will solve the problem with bears on a potato field of any size for a long time.​

Removal of wheatgrass from the soil. Its rhizomes are the most favorite delicacy for the wireworm, and if they are not present, the number of larvae will be significantly reduced.

They quickly move from one territory to another, so one infected area will eventually lead to the defeat of the entire summer cottage.

Add ashes, chalk and lime to the soil more often. An excellent remedy is dolomite (lime) flour. Lime the soil in this way once every four years and always well in advance of planting potatoes. You can use crushed eggshells. Scatter it regularly throughout the area throughout the summer. In this case, the wireworm will no longer harm your crop, rest assured.​

Sow beans or beans between potato bushes.

Ekaterina DREEVA, Mykolaiv region

In the second half of August, I harvest potatoes and sow the plot with rye or oilseed radish. In late October - early November, I dig up the site and make trenches 25 cm deep every 70 cm.

Caterpillars develop within 14-35 days and reach 45-55 mm in size at the last 6th instar. The color of caterpillars is earthy gray, along the dorsal side there is a lighter reddish stripe, the epidermis is unevenly granulated. Head and thoracic shield dark brown. Caterpillars pupate in the soil at shallow depths. The pupal phase lasts 13-25 days. Pupae are dark brown. Body length 19-25 mm. Wintering in the northern regions occurs at the pupal stage, in the south - at the caterpillar and butterfly stages.

​Systematic destruction of weeds mechanically or by applying herbicides (glialka - 40-80 ml, glyfogan - 30-40, glyphos - 30-40 ml, zencor - 15-20 ml. lapis lazuli - 15-20 ml, roundup - 30-40 ml, racer - 40-60 ml, stomp - 100 ml, super targa - 20-60 ml, titus - 5 g + 20 ml surfactant Trend for 20 l of water (1000 m2), topogard - 40-60 ml, hurricane-forte - 75-100 ml, fusilade super - 40 ml, fusilade-forte - 40-50, tornado - 30-40 ml per 10 liters of water to kill wheatgrass).​

Summer temperatures do not play a special role, short days (12 hours) are more important for her. The number of generations of moths, depending on climatic conditions, ranges from two to eight.

Usually, the nematode damages the tissue superficially, along the edges of the tuber, how its damage differs from late blight damage. The middle of the tuber remains healthy. Only in the final stages, when harmful microorganisms join the stem nematodes, does the destruction spread in depth, as a result of which the tuber rots.

Medvedki

Mulching the site is simple and effective way. A layer of mulch prevents the soil from drying out completely, and the soil will always remain wet. In order for the bear to disappear for a long time, the layer of mulch should be at least 15-20 cm. Surface loosening in late May or early June. At the same time, wireworm eggs come to the surface, and after exposure to sunlight they will not be viable. The larvae will not appear on the site, and the crop will be saved.​

In addition, insects calmly survive the winter, and also know how to hide in the soil from poisons, so a simple dressing will not solve the problem.

Potato pests: bear

Sow marigolds and calendula around the perimeter of the potato plot, which repel pests with their smell.

Last season, from the Colorado potato beetle, when planting potatoes, I threw one pea seed into each hole, after two meters I made a new row - and in the summer there was no pest. I watered the potatoes regularly. The tubers grew healthy and large.

By this time, I collect all flowers with a strong smell from the site (calendula, marigolds, etc.), stalks of beans, beans, nettles, waste after harvesting garlic, onions. I grind everything, mix it, fall asleep in trenches and sprinkle it with earth.

• Widely distributed, especially in temperate and subtropical countries of the northern and southern hemispheres, with the exception of the Far North and the desert regions of Africa and Central Asia. On the territory b. The USSR is found south of the line St. Petersburg - Petrozavodsk - Vologda - Perm - Tobolsk - Tomsk - Irkutsk - Blagoveshchensk, in Primorsky Krai, as well as in the very south of Sakhalin, on the Kuril Islands Kunashir and Shikotan (Velikan et al., 1981, 1982; Kononenko, 2003; Sukhareva, 1999).​
• Medvedka harms
• Caterpillars damage plants and tubers. During the growing season, they bore into leaves (less often - into stems and tubers) and lay eggs. In storage, eggs are laid on the eyes of tubers. Born caterpillars make moves in them. Various microorganisms penetrate into damaged tissues, causing the development of dry and wet rot.
• ​The main source of pest spread is tubers, but it can also be soil if potatoes are grown after potatoes infected with a nematode. During storage in conditions of high humidity, the nematode from the infected passes to neighboring healthy tubers.
• You can fight the bear with the help of other plants. She does not like marigolds, so they can be planted between rows and along the edges of the field. Sometimes they fight with it with the help of eggshells, poured with oil. The insect eats the bait and dies, as the oil closes the airways. Chemical methods of struggle give only a temporary result, therefore, folk remedies are often the most effective.

Scoop caterpillars

Alternating potatoes and legumes in the field. Such a crop rotation will avoid the appearance of a wireworm: the larvae will not have time to adapt to the new food, and the potatoes will remain intact. In addition, the soil will be periodically enriched with nitrogen, and this will increase the yield.​

There are several ways to deal with the Colorado potato beetle:

Description

Digging up the area late autumn, without breaking clods, so that the wintering larvae, once on the surface, die, and sow with green manure.

Nadezhda NIKOLAEVA, Engels

In late April - early May, I prepare trenches for planting potatoes. I dig to a depth of 10 cm, put the peel of tangerines, oranges, bananas, as well as onion and garlic husks, ashes. I sprinkle with earth, add humus and plant sprouted potatoes (if the soil is dry, I spill the trenches the night before).

Wide polyphagous. polycyclic view. In the northern regions of the European part of Russia, in the Baltic states and Western Siberia, it develops in 1 generation; in the central regions of the European part and in the Far East - in 2; in the North Caucasus - in 2-3 generations; up to 3-4 generations may be in Transcaucasia, Central Asia and Kazakhstan (Pospelov, 1989). Migrant. Moisture-loving and heat-loving species, and therefore in the south the scoop is numerous in areas with high humidity and on irrigated lands, and in the north - on light and better warmed lands.

Underground parts of tomatoes, cabbage, peppers, eggplant and other garden crops, eats sown vegetable seeds. Especially fond of cucumber seeds. Shoots dry out, damaged plants can easily be pulled out of the soil.

Tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, tobacco and weeds of the nightshade family also suffer from potato moths. In places where potato moths are found, healthy seed material is used, in autumn and spring they dig deep into the soil, plant potatoes (better warmed up) at an optimally early date.

(Leptinotarsa, Doryphora, decemlineata Say)

Potato nematodes are microscopic worms that penetrate into potato tubers and infect the root system. The disease of the plant is manifested by yellowing of the leaves, and the crop can be irrevocably damaged by the nematode over time. The pest reproduces by cysts, which very quickly stick from one area to another: they can move with tubers, parts of the rhizome, even the soil can be infected, so a clod of earth from a shovel can transfer the pest to the other side of the field.

If for some reason agricultural technologies do not suit you, you can use folk remedies for pest control. It is known that the wireworm does not like onions, so watering the holes with onion broth before planting will scare away the wireworm. You can also put a handful of onion peel or mustard powder in each well, which the wireworm also does not like.

The first simple and very effective way is to manually assemble the beetle. One female lays more than 400 eggs, so the destruction of even one insect will at least partially reduce the growth on the site. For a person, the beetle is completely harmless, therefore, apart from some psychological discomfort, nothing threatens you. You can arrange bait for the beetle: in early spring as soon as the soil thaws, potato cuttings are laid out on the site or young sprouts are planted. In a day, the beetle will come out to feast on fresh food, and it can be collected in jars of water and destroyed. After a real landing, the assembly will have to be carried out daily for systematic destruction. It is necessary to eliminate not only adult beetles, but also found larvae.

Potato caterpillars

Of the chemical means of control, if there is a lot of wireworm, add Provotox to the wells before planting at the rate of 40 g per 10 sq.m - it destroys wireworm larvae.

If there are too many Colorado beetles, I spray the bushes twice with a weekly interval with a solution of Bitoxibacillin (50 g of powder per 10 liters of water). It is safe for humans and animals and is suitable for any phase of potato vegetation.​

Further work - weeding, hilling (2 times per season) and watering if necessary. Marigold or marigold flowers, if they germinate, are only partially removed when weeding, so that they drive away pests with their smell. Many neighbors got rid of the Colorado potato beetle using my method.​

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Potato pests « Garden tricks

In root vegetable crops and in potato tubers, the bear eats large cavities, which then rot, gnaw through the stems and tear the roots. Medvedka, although he lives mostly underground, can fly over considerable distances at night, and also swims quickly in the water.

Let's "cheat" a little

Self-seeding and weeds of the nightshade family are also destroyed, the bushes are highly spudded, and the tops are cut off before harvesting. Cellars and other places of storage are whitewashed with lime. The temperature during storage should not exceed 3-5oC. If it is not possible to store potatoes at low temperatures, they are protected with biological products: lepidocide or bitoxibacillin. On the day of harvesting, the tubers are immersed in a 1% suspension of the drug (100 g per 10 liters of water) for 4-5 minutes.

belongs to the family leafworms (Crysomelidae), up to 1 cm long and up to 7 mm wide. Body reddish-yellow, elytra light yellow, with 5 black longitudinal stripes; on the thoracic shield there are several black dots, in places merging into spots; the top of the thickening antennae and the posterior edge of the head are also black.

The first manifestations are yellowing of the lower leaves of the potato bush.

Without Colorado potato beetle

You can fight them with traps. Holes are dug on the site, in which young potato leaves are placed, and after a while the pests can be collected and destroyed. This will prevent re-infection, since each female is able to lay several hundred eggs.​

Selection of resistant varieties. Some varieties of potatoes are less susceptible to the pest, so you can get by with just one or two dressings. Among them are the varieties Temp, Iskra, Zaryevo and some others.​

How to deal with a bear

​Elena KARNAKOVA, Irkutsk​

From the bear I dig plastic bottles with a cut bottom into the aisles to the brim. I pour into them 200 ml of a mixture of honey (1 tablespoon), ground pepper (20 g), hot water (1 l). Medvedka, attracted by the smell, climbs into the bottle, but can no longer get out.

Vera NIKITENKO, Polotsk

Beetles will be driven away ... beetles

Caterpillars live in the top layer of the soil, going out to feed at night. Individuals of younger ages eat leaves, older ages gnaw the stems of seedlings, and caterpillars of the 1st generation cause more damage. In natural habitats, it prefers to develop on plants from the haze and Compositae families.

Due to their secretive lifestyle, birds do not pose a threat to her. The bear causes the greatest damage to gardens with well-manured, regularly irrigated, loose, humus-rich soil.

Not to taste

Then they are dried and stored. Of the chemical agents for combating caterpillars, you can use, for example, decis, cymbush, combining them with treatments against the Colorado potato beetle. Additional processing is carried out at the end of August only against moths so that the caterpillars do not penetrate the tubers.

Damages vegetables, melons, industrial crops. It causes the greatest damage in Ukraine and Belarus. sugar beets, potatoes, tomatoes. In the Transcaucasus, it periodically severely harms cotton, tobacco, sunflower, corn, and essential oil crops. In Southern Siberia and in the south of the Far East, it can severely damage vegetables, as well as damage seedlings and seedlings of tree species (pine, maple, Manchurian ash and walnut). The economic threshold of harmfulness is 3-5 caterpillars/sq. m. The development of the bear is as follows: in the spring, when the soil warms up to 12-150C (first half of May), the bears crawl out of their hibernation places and, in search of food, begin to make numerous horizontal passages in the soil at a depth of about 2-5 cm. During the breeding season (May, June), bears appear on the surface of the earth. Near the main passage, they arrange a nest-cave 6x6 cm in size at a depth of 10-20 cm.

Wireworms

Peas from the Colorado potato beetle

Beetles hibernate in the ground; come out in the spring during the appearance of potato greens, which they feed on before they begin to multiply. 12-14 days after mating, the female lays yellow testicles on potato leaves, up to 11/2 mm long. each, in bunches. The egg laying period lasts up to 40 days; one female lays only up to 700 and even up to 1200 testicles. From the eggs, a week after their deposition, larvae hatch, which also feed on potato greens; they grow quickly - within 17-20 days, molt 3 times and adults go into the ground to pupate.

If you dig out the affected bush, you can find small grains of sand - cysts on its roots: this is one of the main signs of nematode damage.

Attack on pests

To avoid the appearance of pest butterflies, it is necessary to get rid of flowering weeds in a potato field. Butterflies feed on pollen, and in the absence of flowers, they will not appear on the field. In addition, traps are located at a height of 1 m: containers with kvass or molasses. Insects will flock to the sweet smell, after which they can be eliminated.​

Chemicals very often do not give the effect that can be achieved with relatively simple folk remedies, tested by many gardeners.

Potato pests: Colorado potato beetle

Away, bear!

Dmitry KHARCHEVKIN, comrade Bryansk

With us, she smoked trouble for a long time, causing damage not only to the roots of plants, but also eating the root crops themselves. Alder and aspen branches helped. They broke fresh twigs (with bark) and stuck them into the ground at a distance of 0.5 m from each other along all potato ridges - and the bears left the garden very quickly. It turned out that the pests can not stand this smell and go away. The branches were changed several times during the season for new ones.​

Repulse the attack!

​Tatyana CHUPRAKOVA, Minsk​

Agrotechnical protective measures: destruction of weeds, removal of plant residues from the field after harvesting, deep autumn plowing, inter-row tillage, optimally early sowing dates, inclusion of vetch-oat busy fallows in the crop rotation, digging ditches and furrows, watering.

There they lay dark yellow eggs in heaps (500 pieces!). After 2 weeks, larvae appear from the eggs, leaving the nest in late June - early July. Medvedki become adult insects capable of producing offspring only the next year, but even in the larval stage they quickly destroy cultivated plants.

10 Ways to Defeat the Wireworm

- These are the larvae of click beetles (family Elateridae - Click beetles). Already with an average number of 6-8 pieces per 1 m2, they damage up to 60% of potato tubers and other crops.

The first devastations made by him were noticed in 1859 in the state of Colorado - hence the name of the beetle. Notable for its monstrous fecundity and unusual endurance with respect to climatic influences, both in the larval and imago stages, the K. beetle quickly spread by gradual flights over almost all eastern regions. the states of North. America, and in 1874 finally appeared in masses on the shores of the Atlantic Ocean.

However, European farmers have been successfully coping with this scourge for a long time and use several methods for this:

Good day!

Potatoes have long and firmly entered our diet and settled in the plots. It is not difficult to grow it, but a lot of the crop can be lost due to pests. In this article, we will consider the main potato pests with photographs and a detailed description.

Potato pests with photos and descriptions

Colorado beetles

Well known to many, striped beetles. The main color of chitin can be from yellow to yellow-brown with longitudinal dark stripes. Adult insects and their larvae are the most dangerous pests for planting potatoes. Pests that have appeared on the site can halve the crop of tubers.

The greatest harm from colorados of all stages of development is caused during flowering and tuber formation.

"Folk ways" of dealing with Colorado potato beetles:

• collection and destruction of insects of all ages from eggs to adult beetles;
• spraying plantings with infusions or decoctions of tansy, celandine or basil;
• mixed planting of potatoes and plants that repel pests with their smell. Most often it is legumes or coriander.

Of the chemicals, Taboo, Spark, Aktara or Commander are most often used. The main disadvantage of these preparations is that they must be used at least 20 days before harvest.

A good result is also given by biological products - Fitoverm or Agravertin. Their waiting period before harvesting is only 5-7 days. In addition, they are effective against pests of all ages.

wireworms

Hard as a wire, the larvae of the click beetle grow up to 3 cm in length. They live in the soil, they especially love the thickets of wheatgrass, where they feed on the underground parts of this weed. The larva does not deny itself the pleasure of eating potato tubers. The fight against this pest in a potato field begins with the fight against wheatgrass.

A tuber damaged by a wireworm is affected by rot pathogens, nematodes and various viruses.

To protect potato plantings from wireworms, you must:

• use fertilizers containing ammonia for feeding;
• reduce excessive acidity of the soil by adding lime to the soil;
• constantly loosen the soil and fight weeds;
• treat tubers before planting with insecticidal preparations of plant or chemical origin.

Taboo provides protection for potato bushes from pests for up to 45 days.

In appearance, the pest is similar to aphids or fleas. They use plant cell sap as food. The insect pierces the outer shell of the leaf and drinks the contents of the tissue. In this place, damage is formed, the tissue around which dies off, the leaf surface actively creating chlorophyll is reduced and the roots receive less nutrients.

Through damage in the outer shell, viruses, bacteria, spores of harmful fungi penetrate into the leaf. Moving from one plant to another, leafhoppers carry pathogens of infectious diseases, in particular, stolbur.

In the fight against this pest, good results are shown by such drugs as Taboo, Cruiser and Karate Zeon. With their help, you can not only protect the tubers before planting, but also destroy pests in areas adjacent to the potato bed.

These pests are found in potato crops all over the world. Adult bugs, growing up to 3 mm, damage the tops of potatoes, and six-legged larvae reproduce and live on the roots and in potato tubers. Thanks to their efforts, more than half of the harvest of the second bread can be lost.

The spread of the pest is facilitated by elevated air temperatures at low humidity and planting potatoes at a later date.

You can understand that fleas have settled on potatoes by dry spots and depressions on the surface of the leaves.

Flea control measures:

1. Taboo drug used every 10 days.
2. sticky traps for adult insects;
3. in small, private areas, treatment of plantings with chamomile infusion or a mixture of wood ash and tobacco dust can help.

Potato nematodes

Microscopic worms, which you cannot see without magnifying devices. With the naked eye, only traces of the presence are visible, similar to millet grains, which cover the roots of a diseased plant.

Potato bushes affected by this pest grow more slowly, turn yellow on them. lower leaves, and the tubers may not start.

Control measures:

• planting pest-resistant varieties;
• correct crop rotation, including sowing green manure that cleans the soil from pests - legumes, corn, perennial grasses;
• return of potatoes to their original place no earlier than after 4 years;
• soil treatment from a pest with carbamide, thiazon or heterophos.

Another widespread potato pest. The greatest harm is caused by its larvae, which live in the soil for 4 years, and if in the first two years the harm from them is minimal, then in the last years of their life of the larvae in the soil they cause significant damage to potato plantations.

Departure may beetles occurs at the end of April - beginning of May. The females begin to lay eggs, which will hatch into larvae after a few weeks. At this time, there is no harm from them, there is even a small benefit, because. they can only feed on organic residues, enriching the soil with the products of their vital activity.

As the larva grows, its food habits change and they switch to growing roots and tubers. In the fourth year of life, in the spring, an adult beetle will fly out of the larvae.

Beetle control methods:

collection and destruction of larvae;

1. arrangement of night traps for adult beetles;
2. covering the soil surface with mulching material sawdust or straw;
3. loosening the soil in spring;
4. attraction of birds that destroy beetles and their larvae;
5. the introduction of nitrogen into the soil, repelling insects;
6. the use of chemical and biological preparations;
7. watering small areas with a pale solution of potassium permanganate or infusion of onion peel.

Medvedka

By damage horticultural crops approaches the three or four year old larva of the Maybug.

Signs of the presence of a bear on the site:

1. noticeable small round holes in the beds;
2. the bear leaves underground passages visible on the surface of the soil;
3. plants damaged by a bear quickly wither and fall;

Fighting methods:

• after harvesting, in the fall, pits are arranged in the beds - traps. They dig holes, fill them with horse manure and cover the holes with earth. With the onset of frost, manure from the hole is scattered over the site, the bears wintering in manure will freeze;
• deep digging of the soil in autumn;
• scare away the bear with pungent odors - coniferous, onion, garlic or rotten fish;
• set traps from fermented drinks or beer;
• chemicals: Prestige, Thunder, Medvetoks;
• set up poison traps: boil thick porridge and mix it with an odorless pesticide or mask the smell with odorous vegetable oil;
• timely harvest.

Helps in pest control. Weed removal and other preventive measures. It is better to prevent the breeding of harmful insects than to fight them. Now we know them “by sight” - potato pests with photographs and full description. Also get to know

I wish you a healthy harvest!

Sincerely, Sofia Guseva.