One Month Out - FAW Injury Continues…

As reports of Fall Armyworm feeding injury continue, it’s a good time to remain vigilant at scouting. Some fields have already reached the economic threshold for treatment a second time and it’s good to see a) if the insecticide worked and b) how the stand is recovering post feeding.

Other stands (including pastures) may be seeing noticeable damage for the first time. With the window we have between now and winter dormancy closing, retaining forage biomass is critical to next year’s production.

While Fall Armyworm typically works on about a 30 day cycle, not every FAW is on the same schedule. This image is from earlier this week:

The arrows indicate larvae less than 3/8″ long you can’t see walking across a stand or even digging through it on your hands and knees. While there are a few larger larvae, small ones (found by ‘sweeping’ with a bucket) make up the majority of the larva numbers. Even if you aren’t seeing larvae, it’s still a good idea to look for injury symptoms (windowpaning, leaf edges fed on…) and consider sweeping as well. With any luck, numbers will be lower and injury reduced this time, but being on top of feeding is still important.

NOTE: Pheremone trap numbers did increase slightly this week in our trap SE of Holton and are still very high. The trap NE of Grantville saw much lower numbers this week, but damage reports from that area have been consistent over the last couple of weeks when numbers were similarly high there.