Moth Trap Counts for June 9, 2017

Pheromone traps are up and recording data in a number of counties around Mississippi again this year. We will try to report the counts weekly to help you maximize your efficiency in scouting crops for worms. Pheromone traps can’t replace in-field scouting, but can alert you when flights are unusually high or low. Each county reported is the average of 3-4 traps scattered around the county. Counts often vary between traps, but they tend to go up and down together. For example, the 3 traps in Sunflower county this week had 14, 159 and 672 bollworm moths for the week. For all 3 traps this was an increase over the 1, 5 and 227 moths caught last week. With this level of variability between traps, the data from a single trap doesn’t tell us much about the pressure in the region, so this is why field scouting remains very important.

Below are the counts for this week. Tobacco budworm pressure in the Delta was negligible, but was higher in NE Mississippi. Bollworm pressure was substantial in most counties, generally at or above average catches for this date, so thorough scouting of susceptible crops is warranted.