1997 Suffolk County Oriental Beetle Pheromone Trap Monitoring Program

Abstract

Oriental beetle grubs are serious pests of turf grasses and nursery stock. Root feeding larvae have caused severe damage to containerized and field grown nursery stock in Suffolk County. The adult beetles, however, are rarely seen, and direct sampling is very difficult. A recently developed pheromone (Zhang et al. 1994) can be used to monitor flight activity of adult males, which may be correlated to subsequent larval infestations. Use of this pheromone for monitoring can test this hypothesis, and determine whether pheromone traps might be a useful tool for predicting the severity of an infestation or the need for control.