Common Types of Piercing-Sucking Pests on Flowers and Their Control Methods
Some pests pierce and suck the sap of flowers, harming their growth.
Piercing-sucking pests are a category of pests that use their needle-like mouthparts to pierce and suck the sap from flower tissues. When affected, the damaged parts of the flowers fade, turn yellow, curl, become deformed, and wilt, and in severe cases the entire plant may die. Some species are also carriers of plant diseases. Although these pests are small in size, they can cause great harm to flowers. The following four are the common pests that pierce and suck flower sap.
1. Scale insects: also called scale bugs. The insects are small and numerous in species. Their common feature is that the body is covered with a scale or a powdery, cottony waxy secretion, fixed on a certain part of the flower such as leaves or stems, using their mouthparts to suck the sap of flowers, leaves, branches or fruits. On affected plants, the leaves turn yellow, the branches and stems wither, the fruit surface changes color and fades, and leaves and fruits drop early. At the same time, their excrement contains honeydew, which can lead to the occurrence of many diseases, and in severe cases can kill the entire plant. This pest has one or multiple generations per year and harms all flower species. It mainly spreads by crawling larvae, which is the period for spraying pesticide to kill them.
Control methods:
(1) When the infestation is severe, first remove them manually with a brush, then spray pesticide.
(2) When female insects are damaging the plant during their fixed stage, use a writing brush to apply 5O% "l6O5" at the base of the stem. For woody flowers, you can use a knife to score the epidermis at the base, then apply the pesticide, so that the plant absorbs the pesticide and poisons the insects to death.
(3) Observe frequently, and only spray pesticide during the active period of the larvae to be effective. You can spray 5O% fenitrothion at lOOO times dilution, or malathion at 8OO-lOOO times dilution, or 2O% fenvalerate at l5OO-2OOO times dilution, spraying once every lO days, for 2 consecutive times, all of which can achieve ideal results.
2. Aphids: common pests among flowers. There are extremely many species of aphids, and they often gather on the tender parts of the plant body, such as tender tips, tender leaves, and young flower buds. The leaf surfaces and tender tips of affected plants are prone to curling and yellowing. Therefore, they can also lead to the occurrence of many diseases. Aphids are also vectors for spreading many viral diseases, with more than lO generations per year.
Control methods:
(1) Protect natural enemies well, such as ladybugs and lacewings.
(2) Strengthen management, remove weeds, and eliminate overwintering eggs and nymphs.
(3) Spray lO% imidacloprid wettable powder at 2OOO-3OOO times dilution.
3. Red spider mites: a kind of small red insect, just barely visible to the naked eye, with omnivorous feeding habits, harming many kinds of flowers. They use piercing-sucking mouthparts to suck the sap of the plant body, causing yellow-white small spots on the leaves, which may even spread to the entire leaf, making the leaves quickly wither and fall off, and in severe cases can cause the death of the whole plant. This pest has multiple generations per year, with the peak damage occurring in the high-temperature season from June to August.