David Haviland, Entomology Advisor, UCCE Kern County
Over the past few weeks there have been numerous reports of bug invasions near Ridgecrest, Inyokern, and other cities in the high desert of eastern Kern County. Residents and business owners have reported large aggregations of bugs within their homes, businesses, and on the streets. There have been no reports of damage to agricultural crops, landscape plants, or people. However, the nuisance and paranoia associated with bugs crawling on business walls and people has led to numerous inquiries into what is going on and how long it will last.
The bugs belong to a family of insects called lygaeids that are commonly referred to as seed bugs. Seed bugs use their straw-like mouthparts to extract moisture and nutrients from a wide range of plants, especially ones with seeds. The specific species of insects being found in Ridgecrest and surrounding areas is called Melacoryphus lateralis. It does not have a common name. This bug is very similar in appearance to other insects in the families Lygaeidae and Rhopalidae, such as the boxelder bug and milkweed bugs. It is not a beetle.
M. lateralis is found throughout the western United States and is most common in desert areas of Arizona, Nevada, Texas, and southern California. Immature and adult insects feed on native desert plants and then fly to find new feeding sites or mates when they are adults. Adults are highly attracted to lights and can fly long distances, especially in search of succulent plants on which to feed as desert plants become dry during mid-summer.
Populations of this insect vary from year to year with outbreaks most commonly reported in the Sonoran Desert areas of Arizona in years with elevated monsoon-like weather associated with above-average rainfall. In the areas around Ridgecrest, above-normal populations of this pest in 2015 are likely the result of a mild winter followed by above-normal rainfall in February that provided ample food for nymphs throughout the desert. Then, in July and August, the combination of drying host plants and the attractiveness of lights has caused mass migrations of the bugs to urban homes and landscapes.
Management of the bugs is difficult due to the migratory nature of adults. Pesticides that kill insects on contact, such as home perimeter treatments used by licensed pest control companies, can provide excellent control of bugs that they come in contact with, but are unlikely to have any residual effects after one or two days. Businesses and homeowners are encouraged to keep doors closed and turn off lights whenever possible after dusk to reduce the risk of attracting bugs. Once bugs get inside structures, vacuuming is the preferred method for their removal. Outdoors the bugs can be swept with a broom or blown away from business entrances, porches, or parking lots with a leafblower.
Nobody is certain how long the insects will be around. However, reports from Arizona suggest that aggregations of adults occur in July and August, which suggests that populations are likely to become reduced over the next few weeks. These reports also suggest that the outbreaks that are occurring in 2015 are likely a one-time anomaly that won't repeat itself again unless the favorable environmental conditions for the bugs are repeated. For the sake of Ridgecrest residents, let's hope that doesn't occur.
- Author: Dustin Blakey
We have a lot of trees in our area related to poplars: aspens and cottonwoods are two common examples. Most species in this genus (Populus) are subject to infestations of the poplar bud gall mite. I've seen a couple samples each summer in our area.
The gall mite causes strange growths called galls mostly on buds of last year's growth. Cottonwoods and poplars seem to get it often, but some species and cultivars are resistant. It's not usually fatal. In some cases the infestations are bad enough to cause real problems and branch dieback.
This is what it looks like:
The pest in this case is an eriophyid mite. For the curious, pictured below is the bindweed gall mite. It's a relative that looks about the same. Honestly, it doesn't matter what the pest looks like because you would need a powerful microscope to see them. They're very tiny! (Much smaller than spider mites.)
Heavy infestations can kill branch tips and set a tree up for future problems. Small infections are largely harmless. It's been my observation that most galls occur on the lower portion of the tree.
If you check out the UC IPM website, it just throws its hands the air unhelpfully and says don't worry about eriophyid mites. It's right. There really isn't a lot a homeowner can do about it. For this pest, pruning off the galls often helps the next year if you get them all—and there aren't too many.
Spraying doesn't often work. Although it would make you feel like you were doing something, I would probably try to talk you out of it.
Utah State Extension has some information about this pest if you want to learn more.
- Author: Dustin Blakey
Master Gardeners are often asked to identify plants, insects or diseases from pictures. It's great that we have this technology and we're happy to do it. Unfortunately many pictures we receive look like this:
The biggest problem we get is images out of focus.
Here are some tips to help you take good pictures of leaves and plant parts:
- If you are using a digital camera, look for a button that looks like a tulip. Pressing it will allow you to focus closer than normal.
- On a smartphone, usually holding the camera steady and clicking on the point on the picture you want in focus will do the trick. Smartphone cameras will let you get surprisingly close up, the trick is just getting them to focus on what you want.
- Take lots of pictures, examine them, and just send the clear ones (zoom in on image to make sure it's in focus)
- On a regular camera, put the object you want in focus directly under the camera's focusing region, usually the middle of the frame. Press the shutter 1/2 way and hold it there. If the camera can focus on the spot it will make a noise and usually puts a green square on the screen. Press the rest of the way. What usually happens is that the camera tries to focus on something more distant (like the ground) if you don't force the camera to focus where you want it.
- Hold still! hold the camera or phone close to you or set it on a rock or stump to steady it. Close up it's easy to have blurry pictures
- If you're just taking a picture of a leaf close up, pluck it off, set it on a table and then take a picture. This works great:
- It helps to get a picture of the whole plant as well as a close up
- If you want a plant identified, get close ups of the flower (so we can see the parts in focus) and the leaf as well as the overall form. Where it located is helpful.
- For identifying disease, a picture of the sick/dying part is helpful. Try to get parts in the process of dying, not already crispy.
- When you're close, you won't be able to get the whole plant in focus. Just make sure 1 important thing is in focus whether that be the leaf or a stem, etc.
- Try to take the picture in bright light.
- Hold the camera perpendicular to the object you're photographing so more of it will be in focus.
- Many times when you're in close to a plant the light levels are low. This means your camera will have to keep the shutter open longer and increases the chances of a blurry picture. If you're worried about low light or just can't keep still enough, turn on the flash. Usually it's on auto but most phones and cameras let you force it to flash. (The control looks like a lightning bolt.) Use this setting. It won't create professional quality images but it will hold everything still.
This isn't a real guide to plant photography, but hopefully will make for clearer images.
Send your images and questions to immg@ucanr.edu.
- Author: Harold McDonald
Why are they called Jerusalem artichokes if they're not artichokes and they're native to the eastern US? Then again, maybe you're not familiar with Jerusalem artichokes. Maybe you know that plant instead as sunroot, earth apple, sunchoke, lambchoke, French potato, Canada potato or even topinambour. All interesting names, no doubt, but they aren't very helpful for classification purposes. Helianthus tuberosus, on the other hand, tells us immediately that we're talking about a sunflower that produces a tuber. While it's debatable whether Homo sapiens is really “the man who knows,” coming up with an organized system for naming living things was a good idea. Categorizing is just one of those things that comes to us naturally. As a matter of fact, research suggests that such sorting is innate (not learned) behavior. It's how we understand the world around us—sorting, predicting, and testing—in short, the scientific method.
Scientific naming is generally credited to the Swedish scientist Carl Linnaeus with publication of his Systema Naturae in 1735. Binomial nomenclature gives each organism a two-word name, the first the genus (which is always capitalized), the second the species name (which is never capitalized, even when derived from a proper name).
Though scientific names are sometimes called Latin names, the names can be drawn from many sources, including Greek and other languages, names of people and places, and even anagrams—the flowering plant species Mullia is an anagram of the onion genus Allium! Quite often though, the species name can be descriptive. A few of California's many paintbrush species illustrate some of these sources.
- Castilleja angustifolia a paintbrush with narrow leaves
- Castilleja chromosa a very colorful paintbrush
- Castilleja densiflorus a paintbrush with very dense flowers
- Castilleja gleasoni from Mt. Gleason, in L.A. County
- Castilleja lemonii named for botanist J. G. Lemmon
Next time: start learning the scientific names of plants!
- Author: Harold McDonald
Last time, we had an introduction to the Salvia genus, which is a diverse group of close to 1,000 species. One of the most widely planted locally is Salvia farinacea. Fortunately, it's more appealing than its common name, mealycup sage, and while it's not one of my absolute favorites, it gets high marks for nonstop blooming and vigorous self-seeding. Though a native of Texas and New Mexico, it's not particularly xeric. ‘Victoria' is the most common cultivar locally, but many others are more desirable. I planted ‘Blue Bedder,' which is taller, from seed. Also easy from seed is Salvia patens ‘Blue Angel.' This has one of the most enchanting blooms of all salvias. unfortunately, it is one of many salvias rated for zones 8-10 perennials. However, if you're growing them from seed, at least it's not costing you much money! Nearly as beautiful, twice as tall, and easily surviving our winters is Salvia azurea grandiflora. This is another one I grew easily from seed. I'm gonna put in another plug here for my source for these. Diane's Seeds has an interesting selection of small, cheap seed packets, friendly personal service and super fast delivery. As long as we're at it, my other favorite seed source—this one for natives and grasses—is Plants of the Southwest in New Mexico.
While all the above are varying shades of blue—the predominant color in the species—salvias do come in nearly all colors, and the best place to find them is in what is probably the most valuable landscaping salvia species for gardeners in the eastern Sierra—Salvia greggii. True to its common name—autumn sage—these are spectacular in the fall when a lot of other flowers have ended their show, but in our area they are pretty much nonstop bloomers from April through July.
An invaluable plant for the front of my garden is Salvia nemorosa. Nemorosa means “of the woods,” so the common name is woodland sage or Balkan clary. ‘May Night' and ‘East Friesland' are two commonly available purple varieties, while ‘Rose Queen' has been showing up locally the last few years as well. I have not tried Salvia nemorosa from seed, but the plants do self-sow and can be divided after a few years. Like many of the salvias, these bloom profusely in the spring, but if you cut back the blooms you can pretty much get blooms throughout the growing season.
Not nearly as well known, and seldom found locally, is Salvia chamaedryoides. Germander sage is native to the high desert of the Sierra Madre Oriental in Mexico (hence, its other common name of Mexican blue sage).
California native plant lovers will notice a glaring omission—Salvia dorrii, our local purple sage. It does have spectacular blooms and is very drought tolerant. I have a few in my yard, but to my mind they just don't give me enough bang for the buck to be worth planting more widely. Salvia chamaedryoides is similar in leaf and flower color, but way more robust. In my yard anyway, for most of the growing season, Salvia dorrii is a bit scraggly and nondescript. I know it may offend the purists, and maybe I just don't know how to handle this species, but it doesn't seem worth the effort when so many other salvias are available.
One of my neighbors has a plant that is pretty close, Salvia pachyphylla. High Country Gardens no longer seems to have it, but I just checked my new favorite website, Flowers by the Sea, and they have it, so perhaps I'll give it a try. Check out this article from the Salvia Guru newsletter about flora of SoCal's Santa Rosa Mountains, featuring spectacular pictures of Salvia pachyphylla.
I almost forgot another spectacular plant, Salvia clevelandii. This 3-foot shrub is native to the chaparral of southern California. This is another one that needs the right location to survive our winters. I have two framing our patio on the south side of the house, and they have flourished there for several years now. They have big, beautiful Salvia dorrii -like blossoms, but the best thing about this plant is its aroma. This is by far the best-smelling plant I know. It would be worth it just for the smell, but like nearly all its cousins in the salvia genus, it has attractive foliage, low water needs and is a haven for wildlife. Every garden has room for at least a few salvias.