Brown Marmorated Stink Bug Update

Brown Marmorated Stink Bug Update. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Fruit Grower Report.

The Brown Marmorated Stink Bug can do a lot of damage to a crop and researchers are trying to find some answers for producers. Don Weber, Research Entomologist with USDA-ARS explains.

WEBER: It attacks various vegetable, fruit and field crops. So apples, pears and peaches it’s definitely on especially as they’re maturing unfortunately. A lot of times that damage is hidden until you cut open the fruit which is very unfortunate. It can affect soybean as well. Various vegetables; tomatoes, peppers.

Weber and his team have been working with stink bug pheromones.

WEBER: We could use this as a management tool to monitor, to make sure we know where the pest is and how high the numbers are so we know what we might do about it but also potentially to use it to trap it out of the crop or near houses where we don’t want it to be.

They have also been working with natural predators of the stinkbug.

WEBER: And they’re mainly these tiny wasp, egg parasitoid, they’re harmless. They don’t sting. They’re main objective in life is to find stink bug eggs and make sure that it doesn’t end up a stink bug, it ends up a wasp.

The wasps actually lay their eggs inside the stinkbug eggs essentially killing the stinkbugs before they hatch.

That’s today’s Fruit Grower Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Ag Information Network.