Farmers should be able to breathe a little easier this year when it comes to dealing with agricultural pests, as an entomologist says Saskatchewan will be better off than other places.
Sean Prager, a professor in the Plant Sciences Department at the University of Saskatchewan, explained this province would be fine in general since most pests don’t like it when it’s wet.
“It looks like we’re probably having a little lighter year overall, but (there are) some things that will like the rain,” he said. “And as it’s been drying out, things have been coming back to a little bit more normal … . The dry parts (of the province), they were going to have more grasshopper issues than usual.”
It will be only certain parts of Saskatchewan that will have higher numbers of grasshoppers than is typically expected, Prager added. He has not heard anything about how agricultural pests might affect the Moose Jaw area, but he believes it won’t be anything “particularly unusual.”
According to the Prairie Pest Monitoring Network, the Moose Jaw area is expected to see an average density of zero to two grasshoppers per square metre this year. That has been the forecast since at least 2016.
The network also predicts for this area that there will be fewer than 600 wheat midges per square metre; one to three cabbage seedpod weevils per 25 sweeps; an average of zero to one pea leaf weevils per plant; and 300 to 600 Bertha armyworm moths.
Some pests do come in cycles, but it depends upon the bug and their biology, Prager explained. Some cycles are annual; some are bi-annual; some depend upon the weather. Tent caterpillars, for example, have a cycle that takes several years to complete.
“For us, a lot of what we have is dependent upon weather, and a lot of our pests come in on the winds from other places … (such as) the southern U.S.,” he added. “They’re small; it’s easy to get blown around. Some can actually fly along with it. Many are capable of moving up and down in the wind column.”
