Entomology Update 7-12-24: Fall Armyworm in Rice, Aphids, Stink Bugs in Soybeans

Extension entomologists Nick Bateman and Ben Thrash discuss fall armyworms in rice, aphids in cotton, stink bugs in soybeans and more.

Transcript

[00:01] Intro/Outro

Arkansas Row Crops Radio, providing up to date information and timely recommendations on row crop production in Arkansas.

[00:12] Ben Thrash

Hey, everybody, today is July 12th. And, you know, we got a little bit of stuff happening. I know Nick’s got some stuff happening in rice, so what's happening?

[00:24] Nick Bateman

Yeah. So, you know, we talk about we've been picking up a few armyworms here and there in rice for, you know, going on month and a half, two months at this point. And it's like everything everything just snowballed this week, especially like Stuttgart South. That's where the majority of phone calls are from. Finding a ton of small worms in rice. A lot of it is in grassy areas of the field. They're started on that grass moving over to that rice, kind of like what we see in beans. With that being said, we do have a Section 18, it’s a crisis exemption, it’s not the specific. In other words, we've got a 15 day label currently right now for Intrepid 2F for armyworm control in rice. There's a specific exemption that's being reviewed. Odds are it'll be approved. So we should have a full season label. But there was enough things going on with armyworms this week that we went ahead and submitted for a crisis. Your rate on that is going to be four ounces, you’re legal up two applications. I will send everybody out a label and the reporting form as soon as I have it in my hand. With that being said, just just be looking for worms. A lot of folks are finding pretty high numbers and a lot of really small worms. You really wanted to look hard. With that being said, stink bugs, stink bugs are so variable right now. I mean, it's one of them things one guy calls says he’s catching 50 on 10, and the other guy's been at 4 to 7 for a week or two. You know, really your only good option there is Tenchu and you know, questions around do a crop oil or not? But if I’m gonna spend 10 to $12 on that product. I'm definitely going to add crop oil to it just to make sure that I get that cheap insurance on random pop up showers. You know, it's fairly rainy fast, but it gives you some extra protection there. Same way spraying in the heat of the day. It's going to help that get down. One other thing on stink bugs. You know, if we're going to spend that kind of money on Tenchu, I would really like to see if we can make it to a little bit of soft dough. And I think we've discussed this for several years now on on Endigo and Tenchu, those those kind of price tags that are, you know, those products have the the residual to give us 14, you know, maybe a few extra days past 14. So if we can wait until them heads start turning, down a little bit and we wait till they start turning it down just a little bit. You know that it should have enough residual there to get us to the end of the year. But really, that's that's about all that's going on right now from a rice standpoint, just really be looking really looking for them armyworms because if we miss them you’ll really be able to tell in about a week when you have a hole out in the field. So really need to be looking for armyworm. 

[03:26] Ben Thrash

Well on cotton plant bugs aren't really aren't really heavy right now it doesn't seem like. Everybody says their plant bug pressure is just kind of, you know, mediocre, I guess at best, unless you're surrounded by corn and stuff. I've got pretty heavy pressure over at Marianna in some of my plots, but I got sorghum and corn all around me. So kind of unless you're in that, it seems like plant bugs just really hadn't been bad yet this year. Aphids and mites, we're we're hearing about aphids. I mean, there's a pretty decent amount of them out there. Like I said, it's not something to get too worked up about this. Next time you get a spray for plant bugs, go with something like transform. Mites - after that storm last week, it sounds like they're they it kind of slowed them up. It might not necessarily have knocked them out, but I think it slowed them down quite a bit from what I'm hearing. And so I would still if it's your first shot going out, I'd go out would probably Abamectin, that's going to be your cheapest option. But you know, if you got if you've gone out with Abamectin and they've came back pretty quick, I’d swap to something like Portal or Zeal. How about on beans? Nick, what are you hearing? I know I've got a few calls on stink bugs this week.

[04:55] Nick Bateman

Stink bugs and just a few on earworms. But the stink bug calls, man, it sounds like some of these some of these earliest beans. I mean, they really acted like a trap crop for mainly it seems like greens, running some fairly high numbers in some cases.

[05:12] Ben Thrash

I’m hearing like 20 on a set of sweeps. Yeah, pretty common.

[05:17] Nick Bateman

So I think we ought to probably talk about threshold for second, though, because some of these early is beans are moving along pretty good. You know, once you get the R6, that threshold goes from 9 to 18 and at R6.5 we can terminate. But you know, your pyrethroids are a good option there. You're running some really high numbers you might consider running acephate, but your pyrethroid is probably good enough. And then you know, the earworm numbers I'm here to relatively low some of them high enough to treat but I mean folks are probably starting to pick some up it seems like in the southern part of the state anyways.

[05:58] Ben Thrash

Yeah, not a whole lot, that I’m hearing there. It's just, you know, a field here, there. For some reason they got in those instead of I guess there might not have been any corn around or something like that. But, but there's a few bollworms in beans out there and then we were talking a little bit. Is that all we got in beans? I mean, that's all I've got to kind of.

[06:21] Nick Bateman

That's really been it. Stink bugs have dominated those phone calls.

[06:25] Ben Thrash

Yeah. Yeah. And it seems to be a bunch of greens is what I'm hearing. You know a lot of this Milo's heading right now. I say a lot of it there's not just a whole lot of it out there. But a lot of what is out there it's it's heading and you got to remember if that stuff’s flowering, midge can be a really really bad pest now I hadn't heard anything about midge, but I think that's just because there's not a lot of sorghum out there. But it can be a devastating pest. So if that sorghum is flowering, you need to be out there scouting it for midge and I think the threshold is like one per head, but I would, if I start seeing a few out there, I'd probably go ahead and hit them with a pyrethroid. But just, that's going to be your cheapest option. But just remember that pyrethroid can end up blowing up some sugarcane aphids out there. If you do have sugarcane aphids, Sivanto, Sivanto’s probably your best choice. But then the other thing we're hearing about is armyworms in the milo as well.

[07:36] Nick Bateman

And a lot of it seem like it's it's Milo that hasn't headed yet, you know, down in the whorl. It’s the same thing we talked about with corn before. One, it's difficult to get product to, and two, really your only control options there's basically a diamide. Besiege, Vantacor, those those sort of products.

[07:57] Ben Thrash

Yeah I have not labeled on it or edge or anything else and yeah.

[08:03] Nick Bateman

Yeah, that's, that's really the only control option. But you know, the, the threshold on it's similar to corn. It takes a whole bunch of them out there to really call any yield loss. And I mean, you know, from a control standpoint, it's going to be difficult too so, you know, that's that's one of the things that from an economic standpoint, it might not pay to spray unless there's a whole bunch of them or it's really late planted.

[08:29] Ben Thrash

Yeah. Now if they get in the head, the threshold’s like, it's one per head on earworms or armyworms. And then those sorghum web worms are pretty darn common in sorghum and but they don't eat near as much as earworms and it's like it's five per head I believe for for sorghum webworm. With that, I mean…

[08:54] Nick Bateman

Oh we probably ought to talk about pastures for just a second. It sounds like this armyworm thing is trickling further north and folks are finding them in pastures before they're finding them in row crops. But you know, the thing about pastures is like Lambda, Dimilin looks fine and of course all your diamides, Intrepid and all that stuff looks great. Thing to keep in mind there's when you cut that pasture you lost what you sprayed. So depending on how close you are to cutting, I mean if you got three or four weeks until you cut it, I might leaning towards like a diamide, something that's going to give me a long residual. Around ten days before I cut it I might be Lambda, Dimilin something that's going to hit them in the head pretty quick, but be relatively cheap. But, you know, it's been the same story for the past several years. Folks spray Lambda two or three times and it just not getting the control they need. I understand it's dirt cheap, but, you know, if it's more expensive to spray something that ain't working than what it is to spray something that does.

[09:59] Ben Thrash

Yeah. And I think Intrepid's also an option there. But you know, like we talked about before that, that Bermudagrass stem maggot can be pretty bad right after cutting and it can really reduce your yields, but pyrethroid is your only option for controlling that stem maggot if you got it out there. So you got army worms and stem maggot, you're going to have to run something, a diamide, or Intrepid or add that Dimilin into your pyrethroid to be able to get control of that, that Midge and the the worms out there. Well, that's kind of all I'm hearing that's happening too much Nick.

[10:46] Nick Bateman

Yeah, things are slowly picking up, but it's still pretty light for it to be mid-July.

[10:51] Ben Thrash

Yeah. Yeah, but if you need us, call us my numbers. 5015173853.

[10:58] Nick Bateman

Mine's 870456848. 

[11:03] Ben Thrash

All right. Thank you very much.