Courtesy: The Almond Doctor
In today’s Almond Matters, brought to you by Valent USA Corporation, the winter months can be an important time of the year for peach twig borer as growers can start spotting early stages of the pest in their orchards.
The holiday season is a little early for growers to worry about peach twig borer emergence. “Typically the pest begins to emerge in early bloom and they begin to come out from the hibernaculas and move up to the tips of the shoots where it bores in,” Valent Field Market Development Representative Tino Lopez said.
It’s not too early, however, for growers to keep an eye on potential populations. “So they go into a hibernacula, which is a little tunnel or cave that they build,” Lopez said. “They overwinter in those hibernaculas and you can find them, typically in the young trees, in the crotches of the branches.”
Lopez said some practices help during the winter months, but the key for growers is to monitor through winter and into bloom. “Some growers may do dormant sprays in their effort to control not only twig borer, but mite eggs and others. They can get some effective control if they do that,” he said. “But right now, growers are basically monitoring and watching for the emergence in the bloom. That’s the ideal time.”