By Clint Thompson
Spring vegetable season is in full swing in South Georgia. Vegetable farmers are managing pests and diseases that are challenging this year’s crops.
Stormy Sparks, University of Georgia (UGA) Cooperative Extension vegetable entomologist, highlighted pests that have been a challenge this year for producers, including one in particular.
“I think thrips have been a problem this spring. They’re dying back down, I think,” Sparks said. “We’ve had a weird situation this spring. We had seedcorn maggot killing transplants. Normally, when you think of using transplants, you’re avoiding those seedling pests. But for whatever reason, this year we had multiple problems, multiple locations where we had issues with seedcorn maggot actually killing transplants which is very unusual.
“Normally you think of it as being a pest in direct seeded crops and it primarily will attack seeds as they are germinating; very small seedlings as they’re coming out of the ground. When you use transplants, you’re avoiding that part of the system in the field, and you normally don’t have problems with seedcorn maggot.”
Sparks said the maggots are usually attracted to decaying organic matter.
“If you plow in organic matter and then put those seeds right in there, that can be very attractive to seedcorn maggot. That’s typically where we have problems,” Sparks said.