There has been a recent expansion of Avocado Lace Bug into parts of the Carpinteria area.  It was more or less located in the San Diego coastal area.  It spreads mainly with people.......

Read about it at the UC-IPM website and the observations of Mark Hoddle, IPM Specialist at UC Riverside. 

https://ipm.ucanr.edu/agriculture/avocado/avocado-lace-bug/#gsc.tab=0

1. ALB does better in the slightly cooler more humid orchards in Oceanside when compared to the hotter inland Bonsall orchards.
2. In the lab, under a fluctuating 24 hr temperate cycle similar to an avocado orchard in Escondido, optimal temps for development are a daily average of around 31-32oC (88-90oF)
3. ALB life stage densities tend to be greater on leaves over June-Oct
4. % leaf infestation measures (i.e., the proportion of sampled leaves with ALB lifestages) tend to be peak over fall-winter (Sept-Feb), but ALB densities on leaves are not as high as what are seen over June-Oct, there are basically more leaves with ALB and those per leaf densities are lower that numbers counted over June-Oct.
5. Its hard to predict what the next season's ALB will be as lots of ALB are shed when leaves drop, but like persea mite, some manage to get back onto the new leaves to start the next round of infestations. Adults don't seem to be very flighty, well, at least they don't seem to exhibit mass flight activity that would suggest searching for new hosts as leaves deteriorate.

Keep your eyes open for a future edition of the CA Avocado Commission's magazine - From The Grove - for a more thorough discussion of the pest. 

https://www.californiaavocadogrowers.com/publications/from-the-grove

 images:

Adult

Adults, young, and fecal pellets

Leaf damage

Avocado Irrigation Workshop

Avocado Irrigation Workshop

October 16 (Wednesday), 2024

2:00 – 5:00 P.M.

UC Cooperative Extension Ventura County (California Room)

669 County Square Dr, Ventura, CA 93003

Workshop registration link: Registration

For more information about the workshop, please contact                                                                                

Ali Montazar, amontazar@ucanr.edu, or Ben Faber, bafaber@ucanr.edu.

 CEU CREDITS:   CCA (2.5 hrs.)

                                                   VCAILG (2.5 hrs.)

Informational Videos Covering Fertilizer Application through Irrigation Water

Now Available in English and Spanish

 Nicole Nunes FREP Grant Program

Through a grant from the Fertilizer Research and Education Program (FREP), Cal Poly's Irrigation Training and Research Center (ITRC) has developed a series of informational videos covering chemicals, application hardware, techniques, and timing of fertilizer application through irrigation water.

The videos are based on information provided in the Fertigation book developed by ITRC and updated in 2019. The Fertigation book is also available in English and Spanish and can be downloaded for free from the ITRC website: https://www.itrc.org/books/index.html

The 22 informational videos are available on YouTube or through the ITRC website and cover the following topics:

1. Overview
2. Basic Fertilizer Chemistry and Vocabulary
3. Nitrogen and the Environment
4. Basic Soil Principles
5. Crop Fertilizer Requirements
6. Testing of Plants Soil and Water
7. Fertilizer Labels Characteristics and Usage
8. Nitrogen Conversions
9. Volatilization of Ammonia from Irrigation Water
10. Irrigation System Uniformity and Efficiency
11. Safety
12. Purging Media Tanks of Chemicals
13. Calibration, Titration, and Travel Time
14. Varying Venturi Injection Rates
15. Chemigation for Soil Infiltration Problems
16. SO2 Generators (Sulfur Burners)
17. Chemigation for Drip System Maintenance
18. Incompatibility of Different Fertilizers
19. Proportional Injection
20. Fertilizer and Chemical Injection Devices
21. Calibration of Fertilizer and Chemical Injectors

More Fertigation Resources Coming Soon

ITRC is developing the informational video series into a Fertigation Certificate Program available to the irrigation and fertilizer industry. The videos will be coupled with information and suggested readings from the Fertigation book to create a comprehensive online course. Course participation will be verified with an exam on the presented materials and successful participants will receive a certificate of completion.

Stay tuned for more information regarding the availability of the certification program.

To learn more about this project and other current and completed FREP projects please visit: https://www.cdfa.ca.gov/is/ffldrs/frep/Research.html

F\ig Wax Scale has recently been detected in the environment in the San Diego County. This insect is commonly intercepted at ports of entry, especially on shipments of palms, but has not previously established a reproductive population in California to our knowledge.

Fig wax scale is an A-rated, actionable invasive pest by CDFA, due to its high potential to damage fresh fruit production through lowering yield, increased production costs, disruption of export markets, and vectoring of plant viruses including grape vine leaf-roll virus. It is a polyphagous phloem feeder and a potentially devastating pest of many high-value crops including almond, grape, citrus, pistachio, avocado, cotton,fig,palms,pear,and ornamentals.In the USA it is currently only found in Florida, although it is distributed throughout much of the rest of the world and frequently affects citrus and fig production in Europe. The environmental conditions throughout much of California are considered favorable for this scale to establish if it is not eradicated and prevented from re-entering.

For more on this scale and other recent topics, check out the Topics in Subtropics Newsletter:

https://ucanr.edu/blogs/blogcore/postdetail.cfm?postnum=60446