If immediate harvesting is not an option, spraying is recommended weevil control

Monday, May 27, 2013

by BETTER FARMING STAFF

If early harvest isn’t an option, dairy farmers faced with a weevil infestations may be forced to spray. Harvesting dairy haylage, however, is considered to be the best approach to managing weevil infestations.

Spraying is an alternative if scouting shows your crop is above threshold levels and harvest is seven to 10 days away. However, OMAFRA forage specialist Joel Bagg says spraying also kills beneficial insects such as wasps that provide natural weevil control.

In a recent posting to www.fieldcropnews.com, Bagg wrote that “if there is 40 per cent tip feeding and two or three active weevil per stem, and there is more than seven to 10 days to preferred harvest date, consider spraying.”

In Bagg’s May 23 forage report in fieldcropnews, he writes that alfalfa weevil larvae are being reported in increasing numbers in the southwest, adding that in some crops where weevil larvae are above threshold level and that spraying is already being done.

Bagg says dairy farmers in the southwest are expected to be harvesting in full swing this week. They harvests first-cut alfalfa haylage when tests show fibre and energy are at optimim levels. BF