Potato mole, how to deal

The plants of the family of grazers, and especially potatoes, are very susceptible to the dangerous pests. One of these is a potato mole - a very voracious insect, capable of harmful to almost all potatoes crop. Who is such a potato mole and how to deal with it - we will tell you in our article.

Initially, since the potato mole is a very thermal-loving insect, the main aril of her habitat was Southern and Central America, Australia, Africa and the countries of Southern Europe. Gradually, population of potato moth spread around the world, which contributed to the carriage of infected with grained crops. This pest is considered one of the most dangerous for farms, because it is very difficult to deal with it because of the rapid cycle of development, a semi-cold adult sex is rapidly developing from the egg.

The butterfly is a small insect, unsightly dirty gray color, the length of which is 12-16 mm. The potato mole lives a few days, spending during this time to make the calculation of a large number of eggs (in two weeks about 300), the development of which in the larvae, and then in the caterpillars, is fleeting, within two weeks. The laying of eggs occurs on the back of the sheet, the lower parts of the stems, soil and bareballs. From the eggs there are voracious caterpillars, who are bungled to young shoots, tubers and leaves of the plant, filling their moves with excrement. After 2 weeks of such food, the caterpillars are pumped, and fly out with butterflies in 5-7 days. There are up to five continuous cycles of generations, whose peak comes to September and October.

The fight against potato mole is based on preventive agrotechnical measures and liquidation chemical methods. One of the methods of combating potato mole is a full-fledged deep soil perplex for the winter. Potato butterflies and their larvae are not capable of falling at temperatures below -4 ° C, they die as only the soil freezes to such indicators. With a minor frostbite of potato tubers, caterpillars are able to stay alive and under favorable conditions to continue their development cycle (for example, in the repository they can multiply in winter, and in the spring when landing larvae again get into the ground).

Finding the pest on its plot, to destroy all its forms of development and the possibility of subsequent appearance, conduct such activities:

Try to abandon the summer sowing of potatoes, preferred with early grades, which potato mole is practically not terrible.
Before boarding, check, check and screen damaged tubers. The remaining possible make fumigation (exposure to poisonous pairs).
Tubers disembark to the maximum allowable depth.
During the growing season, conduct a plant inspection, plunge it, remove weeds. When detecting larvae or caterpillars with shelters from a web, withstanding the frequency, treat plants with preparations used to combat the colorado beetle (olom, decyis, zon, dinadim, foxime).
Cleaning potatoes, like his drying, spend during the daytime, when the potato mole is not active (the villages of the pest takes place at night and morning hours).
After harvesting potatoes, designed for storage, treat special needs (etobacterin, dendrobacillin).
Keeping harvests Store at a temperature not exceeding + 5 ° C, with minimal humidity.

Good results in the fight against potato moth are pheromon traps. These are attractive chemicals for male moths that are used for their catch and subsequent destruction. Females due to the lack of fertilization make an "empty" calculation, as a result of which the emergence of a new generation is excluded.