Squirrels commonly cause damage around homes and gardens when they dig holes, feed on fruits and nuts, gnaw on cables, or chew their way into buildings.
The squirrels in your landscape may be tree squirrels or ground squirrels. If you aren't sure which kind they are, visit the UC IPM web site to read about Tree Squirrels and Ground Squirrels.
If you know your arboreal visitors are tree squirrels, you can read more about them and their management in the newly revised UC IPM Pest Note: Tree...
- Author: Igor Lacan
[From the August 2016 issue of the UC IPM Green Bulletin]
Two “sap flux” diseases observed in landscape trees—bacterial wetwood (or slime flux) and alcoholic (“foamy”) flux—often trigger demands that a landscaper “do something.” Yet the most appropriate action may be to provide cultural care and to monitor for any additional problems rather than to apply chemicals or undergo drastic “tree surgery.”
Symptoms
A single wound or bark crack located on the trunk or a large branch...
/h3>/span>- Author: Karey Windbiel-Rojas
We have received several questions lately from people who've found large, strange looking insects in their garden and landscape. What are these alien-like creatures? Are they good, bad, do they bite?
They are Jerusalem crickets, also sometimes called sand cricket, niña de la tierra (child of the earth), potato bug, and stone cricket.
Jerusalem crickets are relatives of crickets, grasshoppers, and katydids. These large insects can be up to two inches long and have heads that somewhat resemble a human head. Their head and body are amber colored, with dark stripes on the abdomen, long antennae, and no wings. Their thick legs are...
[From the August 2016 issue of the UC IPM Green Bulletin]
The South American palm weevil (SAPW), Rhynchophorus palmarum, was recently discovered in a Canary Island date palm in San Ysidro, southern San Diego County.
Twenty additional Canary Island date palms in the San Ysidro area appear to be infested, but have not yet been confirmed.
Weevil Biology
The biology of SAPW is similar to the red palm weevil that was eradicated from Laguna Beach, Orange County, between 2010–2012. The adult of the South...
/h2>/span>- Author: Niamh Quinn
[From the August 2016 issue of UC IPM's Retail Nursery & Garden Center IPM News]
In many cities across California, urban coyote conflicts appear to be rising. Recent analysis of coyote reports from several entities in southern California has shown that coyote conflicts are generally much higher during the pup-rearing (May–August) and dispersal seasons (September–December), compared with the breeding season (January–April). It is unclear whether this is due to territoriality issues, increased human conflict due to increased coyote activity, increases in energy demands on coyotes when...