is a garden and vegetable pest, small in size, but posing a significant danger to plants if not controlled. The most widespread are pear and apple honeysuckers.
Sometimes it seems that fruit trees in the garden can grow on their own, without requiring any care - you just need to plant the seedlings correctly in a suitable place, and then you won’t have to do anything else. However, it is not.
Fruit trees, especially apple and pear trees, require annual care - watering, fertilizing, pruning and preparation for winter. It is also necessary to protect apple and pear trees from diseases and pests, carry out preventive treatments, and, in case of damage, treat them.
This article will talk about the main pest that affects apple and pear trees - the copperhead or psyllid.
Description of the psyllid
These small insects with a body length of only a few millimeters got their name for their ability to jump, because their hind limbs are similar to the limbs of fleas, which is why these pests can jump.
Also, during their life, a sticky sweet liquid remains on the leaf plates and shoots, which is why this insect got the name “sweetheart”. Photo of copperhead on a leaf:
These pests cause great harm to fruit trees, as they pierce leaf plates and buds with their proboscis and suck out the cell sap from them. Because of this, the foliage and buds dry out ahead of schedule, curl up and fall off.
Lifestyle and harmfulness
The apple honeydew is a monophage. It only damages the apple tree.
Damage to the apple tree is caused by nymphs, which attach themselves to young leaves and flowers even before the buds open. Damaged buds dry out and fall off, and the leaves develop much more slowly and can be 8...10 times smaller than healthy ones (there is, however, evidence that the area decreases by 15...52% - see the lectures of the State Agrarian University, edited by Slepchenko). If the leaves are severely damaged, the tree does not have enough nutrients to form a normal harvest: it discards a significant part of the ovary and forms fewer fruit buds the next year. According to some reports, the vital activity of the apple honeydew can lead to the loss of 15% of flowers and leaf rosettes.
Insects not only suck out the juice, but also excrete large amounts of sticky, sugary excrement. The latter have the appearance of whitish balls covered with a thin shell of a wax-like substance. Wax is secreted by special perianal glands. These balls blur and form a sticky mass that glues the leaves and parts of the bud inside the buds, floods the stomata and impairs aspiration and respiration. In addition, apple psyllid excrement serves as a substrate for the development of sooty fungi, which also impair the functioning of the leaf.
The main signs of the appearance of copperhead on trees
Psyllids may not be immediately visible on fruit trees, since their size is too small. However, the amount of damage caused by these pests can be significant when the insect colony grows large. Therefore, you should know the main symptoms of the appearance of copperhead on fruit trees in order to begin fighting them as early as possible.
The larvae of this pest usually settle in unopened buds - this is where you should look for them in early spring
. And on pear trees, it is the buds that are attacked by adult psyllids.
The main symptoms of the appearance of psyllids on apple and pear trees are:
- since the copperhead sucks the cell sap from the foliage and flowers, when the foliage and buds suddenly turn yellow and fall off in the spring, you can understand what kind of pest has settled on the fruit tree;
- foliage affected by copperhead slows down development and becomes deformed;
- if the copperhead fed on buds, flowers or ovaries, then they begin to dry out;
- deformed fruits form from the surviving ovaries, and their flesh becomes tasteless and tougher than usual;
- Another symptom of the appearance of psyllids on trees is the appearance of a sticky, sweetish liquid on the leaf blades - a waste product of the “harmful” bug. It covers the foliage completely, or accumulates next to the copperhead in the form of small balls. The main danger of this liquid is that it can stick the buds together, preventing the development of leaves and ovaries;
- Apple and pear trees become weaker after an attack by this pest, so they can be affected by pathogenic microorganisms.
Honeydew that appears on leaf blades can become an excellent environment for the development of various pathogens, in particular sooty fungus.
It gradually covers the entire leaf, interfering with the process of photosynthesis.
If sooty fungus moves onto apples and pears, their appearance and taste deteriorate sharply.
Signs of pest damage
Trees on which the sucking insect has settled turn yellow and lose their leaves. The buds in which the larvae lived will no longer bloom. The sticky secretions with which the pest covers the plant breed pathogenic fungi. The tree loses its immunity and does not bear fruit. It dries out in the summer and freezes in the winter.
Even if a flower affected by copperhead survives and is pollinated, its fruit will still be inedible, the shape is irregular, and the flesh is hard and tasteless.
Attention! The first sign of psyllid infestation is a sticky coating on the plant. It shines in the sun's rays and spreads throughout the tree (buds, leaves, branches).
Varieties of copperhead
There are several varieties of this pest that feed on and damage only certain types of garden and vegetable crops.
apple psyllid
As the name suggests, this “harmful” insect can only live on apple trees, feeding on the cell sap of the foliage. Adult individuals of the apple honeydew lay their eggs in the autumn under the bark near the buds, where the clutches overwinter
. In early spring, larvae hatch from them, move to the top of the bud cone and wait for them to begin to open. As soon as the tips of the leaves or buds emerge from the buds, the larvae of the apple borer crawl inside the buds and eat the foliage and flowers.
Photo of apple psyllid or honey psyllid:
In about 30 days, the larvae turn into adult insects
– this process ends approximately with the end of flowering of apple trees. And adult individuals fly to meadows or tree edges, where their main food is various types of herbaceous plants.
Interesting!
In total, only one generation of apple honeydew appears per season.
Around the second ten days of August, adult psyllids return to apple orchards to lay eggs, which overwinter on the trees so that new pests can be born from them in early spring.
Pear psyllids
This type of psyllid is very prolific - up to 5 generations of these “harmful” bugs can be born during the summer season.
The body of these insect pests of pear is darker than that of the apple honeydew.
Photos of pear suckers
The pear honeydew does not lay eggs for the winter - already fully formed individuals overwinter, which can hide from frost in fallen leaves, bark, and in cracks on shoots.
Fighting the copperhead on a pear - video
As soon as the air temperature rises above 0 degrees Celsius in early spring, these pests awaken from hibernation, and at air temperatures above +10 degrees they begin to lay eggs.
It is important to know!
A female pear psyllid can lay more than 1,000 eggs at one time.
Carrot suckers
If there is a pine or spruce forest next to a garden or vegetable plot, then from there a carrot psyllid may fly to the cultivated plants. This pest is smaller than other types of copperhead
- its light green body can reach only 1.5 mm in length.
Insects emerge from hibernation in early spring and at first feed only on the needles of pine and spruce trees. And in the second ten days of May, carrot suckers move into the gardens into beds with young carrot shoots.
In the last ten days of May, the females of these insects begin to lay eggs, which are attached to the back of the carrot tops or to their petioles. Each female can lay up to several hundred eggs
.
After about 20 days, the larvae hatch from the eggs, which become adults after 30 days.
Important!
The carrot sucker species produces only one offspring per season.
How to recognize psyllid among other garden pests
If you see curled leaves in the garden, you can be sure that a psyllid has come to you. It looks like a microscopic dragonfly - a pale green insect with transparent wings. Adults are sometimes called nymphs. Its dimensions do not exceed 1.7 mm, but the scope of the disaster that it brings with it far exceeds the span of its wings:
- females produce up to 5 offspring per season, each clutch containing at least 500-700 eggs;
- the larvae start eating very quickly, therefore, if measures are not taken in time, the garden will turn black, because “sooty” mushrooms also settle on the sweet syrup that they leave behind, which literally turns the tree black;
- When the population of these insects is high, not only the leaves, but also the fruits of the plants suffer. They become smaller, lose their taste and presentation.
Folk methods of dealing with psyllids
In early spring, before the buds begin to bloom on fruit trees, the crowns of apple and pear trees should be treated with infusion of tobacco
or
yarrow
.
To prepare tobacco infusion
, you should dissolve 200-250 g of tobacco residues in a bucket of water and leave to infuse in a warm, dark place for 24 hours. Then the resulting infusion is filtered, poured into a sprayer and treated with fruit trees.
An infusion of yarrow to combat copperhead is prepared as follows:
dry leaves and stems of yarrow are crushed and poured into a bucket, filling it about 1/3, then water is poured to the top of the bucket and left to infuse for at least a few hours. Then the solution is filtered, and the trees are treated using a spray bottle or sprayer.
You can also use a soap solution
or
infusion of wood ash
.
To prepare a soap solution, dissolve a bar of laundry soap in a bucket of water.
. Treat all shoots with the resulting liquid before buds begin to bloom.
The infusion of ash is prepared as follows:
200 g of ash are dissolved in a bucket of water and left to infuse for a day, stirring the mixture periodically. Then the infusion is filtered and fruit trees are sprayed against copperhead.
Adult psyllids can be controlled with tobacco smoke.
. To do this, large piles of hay or dry grass are laid out around the garden, on which tobacco waste is laid (up to a couple of kg for each pile). Then the hay is set on fire and the trees are fumigated. This procedure should be carried out over several hours.
To protect carrot plantings from the vermin pest, the following procedures should be carried out:
- after planting the planting material, the bed must be covered with polyethylene or any non-woven material for a while until shoots appear;
- After sprouts appear, the beds should be covered with sifted wood ash mixed with tobacco dust. To ensure that this mixture remains on the carrot leaves, it is better to carry out this procedure early in the morning, while there is still dew on the plants.
If psyllid pest larvae appear on carrot seedlings, you can treat them with tobacco infusion, which is prepared in the same way as for treating fruit trees.
However, it must be remembered that folk remedies against honeyweed are effective only when the number of pests on cultivated plants is small
. If the copperhead colony has grown, then you will have to use solutions of insecticidal preparations to combat this pest.
How dangerous is honeydew for plants?
The copperhead is a sucking insect. As soon as she leaves the egg, she moves to the most delicious part of the plant and, having pierced the top layer with her proboscis, begins to drink the juices. He loves to eat young leaves that have not yet blossomed from the buds. When the leaves appear, cuttings and stalks are a special delicacy for the copperhead.
Affected trees are easy to recognize: the foliage turns yellow ahead of time, the ovary falls off. The leaves look underdeveloped and their overall density decreases. Plus, you can notice sweet secretions from fleas on the branches, and colonies of fungi can form.
Chemicals against copperhead
To cope with a large number of psyllids on cultivated plants, you need to use certain insecticidal preparations.
To destroy the colony of this pest on garden and vegetable crops, you should use solutions of the following insecticides against the copperhead: Karbofos, Phosfamide, Metaphos or Thiophos.
However, such insecticidal preparations are slightly toxic to humans, but can be destructive to beneficial insects, in particular bees. Therefore, treatment with such means is prohibited during the flowering period of fruit trees.
. It is also not recommended to treat gardens with insecticides that are located near water bodies, so as not to kill aquatic inhabitants.
Flower beetles, honey beetles, leaf rollers, codling moths - video
How to deal with Medyanitsa?
The fight against the copperhead is a multi-stage and quite complex process. But, if you find out where the larvae overwinter, how they then feed and reproduce, then all the necessary measures can be carried out correctly and on time. The best time to destroy larval colonies is during bud break and before flowering. You can use an infusion of tobacco smoke to spray the plant. In more severe cases of infection, measures to combat the pear worm or other type of parasite include spraying with chemicals.
When using strong chemical or biological preparations, you can spray the plant only until the buds open. It is important to take all precautions.
Preventive actions
First of all, you need to strengthen the immunity of fruit trees, because strong, strong apple and pear trees are practically not susceptible to attacks by pests
. To do this, you need to regularly apply fertilizing containing nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium to the tree trunk circles throughout the season.
In the autumn, mandatory sanitary pruning of trees is carried out, removing all damaged, dry or diseased branches, and also cutting off old bark and moss from trunks and shoots. Fallen leaves are removed from the tree trunk circle. All plant residues should be immediately burned off-site.
Despite its small size, the copperhead can cause great damage to apple and pear trees.
– it deprives the foliage of cellular sap, as a result the leaves die, the affected buds and flowers may also die, causing the yield to drop sharply. Therefore, it is necessary to begin the fight against this pest immediately after traces of its presence on the trees are detected.
Life cycle
Adult female psyllids lay eggs on new growth in host plants. Females lay approximately 80 eggs and the nymphs hatch within two to three weeks. The nymphal stage (five instars) requires three to four weeks. The insect is now widespread, with huge populations developing in all habitats during the dry spring season. However, insect numbers decline during the summer, likely due to high temperatures.
Some psyllid species lay eggs several times during their two-month lifespan. However, even if they only lay eggs once, there may still be many new psyllids as most species lay hundreds of eggs at once.
Psyllid eggs hatch in about 4-15 days, depending on the species and temperature.
Non-infectious diseases of apple trees and their treatment (with video)
Suberization of the skin of apple fruits is a non-infectious disease of the fruit. Slightly depressed brownish spots of suberized tissue appear on the fruits, and they are often slightly deformed. Late spring frosts during the flowering of gardens negatively affect the development of flowers, ovaries and young leaves. Frozen flowers and ovaries turn brown and crumble, leaves become deformed and dry out, and partially damaged fruits grow, but their skin becomes corky.
How this apple tree disease manifests itself is shown in the video, which demonstrates the most striking signs:
https://youtube.com/watch?v=2MPIJpXzbJc
Control measures. If the temperature is expected to drop during the flowering of gardens, it is recommended to light fires and create a smoke screen. Young trees and shrubs can be covered with spandbond or lutrasil.
Damage to apple trees by low temperatures.
In winters with low temperatures, frequent thaws and insufficient snow, the bark, cambium, and trunk wood of fruit trees are damaged, and frost cracks appear on the trunk and skeletal branches. Solar-frost burns are observed during sharp daily temperature fluctuations, when the sun-heated bark thaws during the day and freezes again at night. Light spots of irregular shape appear on the southern and southwestern sides of the trunk. In the spring there is a slow bud opening, and in the summer there is a weak growth and drying of the shoots. At the end of summer, the bark cracks and falls off, the wood of the affected skeletal branches and trunks dies. Fungal and bacterial infections spread on weakened trees. Very often, the root system of trees freezes completely, and the affected trees dry out at the very beginning of summer.
Mechanical damage.
In most cases, branches and shoots break off under the weight of the first wet snow or heavy snow cover. In some years, branches break under the weight of fruits or strong winds. This also often happens during transportation or when planting trees, especially large ones. Therefore, in the fall, it is better to tie young plants with twine or rope and periodically shake off the snow from them. The first time after planting or transplanting, plants should be tied to a support; this will protect against bending and fractures of the trunks. Any mechanical damage and cuts of trunks and branches should be disinfected with a 1% solution of copper sulfate and covered with paint using natural drying oil. It is in the places where the wood is cut that it cracks and dies, and the trees gradually dry out.
Watch apple tree diseases and their treatment in the video, which shows the basic principles of agricultural technology and tree care at different times of the year:
