This week's message will cover:

• Great attendance at the deep zone-tillage twilight meeting

• Updated New England Vegetable Management Guide

• First generation European corn borer flight

• Ordering insect traps and pheromones.

• Row covers to prevent early insect pests

• Summer cover crops

• 3 New post-emergence herbicides for 2008

• Perimeter trap cropping for cucumber beetle control

Great attendance at the deep zone-tillage twilight meeting
The Annual Vegetable Growers Twilight Meeting was held last night at Nelson Cecarelli=s farm in Northford, CT.  Over 70 people attended the zone-tillage demonstration and learned how this reduced-till technique can be used to help improve their soil health and structure, reduce their fuel bills, control wind and water erosion, preserve soil moisture and improve plant stands during droughts, reduce dry tips on sweet corn, produce cleaner winter squash and pumpkins, improve soil drainage and reduce diseases, and possibly help them rent land from land trusts or municipalities which often frown on conventional tillage.  The discussion in the field throughout the crowd was very lively and I heard many people make comments such as "wow, this makes so much sense" and "with gas prices increasing the way they are, it may be inevitable that farmers have to zone-till in the future."  Thanks to all who took the time to attend the meeting and learn a new technique.  The next zone-tillage educational activity will be a day-long workshop in Sturbridge during early December.  Hope you can join us then as we continue or education into the art and mechanics of deep zone-tillage. 

Updated New England Vegetable Management Guide
Many of the recommendations that I share with you throughout the season on this pest message are listed in the New England Vegetable Management Guide.  The guide includes a wealth of cultural, pest management and bedding plant information and the 2008-2009 edition of the guide includes color pictures of all the pests.  You can pick one up for the glove compartment of your truck, so that you have it with you in the field, by calling Lori at 860-486-3336.  It sells for $15.  You can also consult the guide for free on the web at www.nevegetable.org.  

First generation European corn borer flight

Pheromone traps in East Lyme and Northford captured 6 and 15 borer moths during the past week indicating that the first generation flight has begun.  We expect higher moth levels next week.  By monitoring the moth population over time, we can more easily determine when the eggs will begin to hatch in early row cover or transplanted sweet corn. When we push the maturity of the corn forward using plasticulture techniques, sometimes the corn is already silking during the peak moth flight and egg hatch.  This makes it impossible to scout the whorl or pretassel stage plants for larvae and leaf feeding to determine if and when to spray a field,  the way we do for bare-ground plantings.  For these early plasticulture fields, we try to apply sprays the week after peak moth catch and the following week. This is timed to coincide with peak egg hatch, and thus we can prevent most of the potential borer damage to the ears of this valuable early corn.  Peak moth flight varies from place to place around the state, so if you are pushing your first plantings using plastic, you may wish to monitor for ECB on your farm.  To monitor ECB flight, set up two Scentry Heliothis traps in the weeds along your field now. Bait one trap with an E (NY or II) pheromone lure and the other with a Z (IO or I) lure.  The trap openings should be at weed height and you should change the lures every 3 weeks.  These same traps can be used to monitor for the beginning of the second generation flight in late July to determine when to spray peppers for borer.  

Ordering insect traps and pheromones
If you plan to monitor for both ECB and corn earworms in your sweet corn this summer you will need at least 3 Scentry Heliothis traps, a pack of 10 Hercon brand CEW lures and 5 of each type ECB lures (both E & Z lures) .  Store the lures in a ziplocked bag in your freezer until they are needed.  It is important that you get the Hercon brand lures for your CEW lures because the thresholds that we use to tell you how often you need to spray are based on the emission rate of this type of lure. Other lures will catch moths, but they won=t tell you what spray schedule you should be on. Set up your CEW traps just before your first sweet corn planting develops silk.  Great Lakes IPM in Vestaburg, Michigan, carries the Hercon brand CEW lure and other IPM supplies, and has low prices.  Some better-known companies do not carry Hercon brand lures. You can reach Great Lakes IPM at 1-800-235-0285 or check their web site at www.greatlakesipm.com  

Before ordering your pheromone lures, you should check the tops of your old traps to make sure the mice didn't chew holes in them while trying to get to dead insects inside over the winter.  Replacement tops for your Scentry traps are only about $17. 

Fall armyworm can be monitored with a $9 green Universal Moth Trap and 3 to 4 FAW lures. You will also need a Vapona killing strip for your FAW trap.  FAW traps tell you that the moths are in the area and when it is time to scout your corn for larvae. Any brand lure will do for monitoring ECB or FAW.   Keep your unused lures in the freezer until they are needed (but not the killing strip).  Replace the lures on your traps every three weeks.  Again, that number for ordering supplies from Great Lakes IPM is 1-800-235-0285.   

Row covers to prevent early insect pests
Organic growers have long used row covers to stop flea beetles or Colorado potato beetles from damaging leafy greens or potatoes in the spring, but there are many other pests that you can use these covers for on a small farm.  Two of the most effective uses are for controlling potato leaf hoppers on beans and to control root maggots on radishes.  To exclude leafhoppers from beans, simply cover each planting from seeding until flower buds begin to open, then remove the covers.  If leafhoppers feed on the beans from bloom on, it will have little effect on yields because the crop load is already determined by the time you reach the flower stage.  Some fields don't seem to have much problem with root maggots on radishes, but if your fields do, keeping radishes covered will eliminate this nuisance.   

Summer cover crops
You can take a field out of production for half a season, either after an early short-season crop like peas or lettuce, before a late planted cash crop, or for the whole season to help loosen hard soils and build organic matter, by planting a summer cover crop.  To help build organic matter and better soil structure try using 30 lbs/A of sorghum-sudangrass or use 50 lbs/A to help suppress weeds too.  However, if weed suppression is what you are after without fertilizer inputs, then buckwheat may be the best choice.  Buckwheat can be sown in late May at 40-100 pounds per acre and killed at bloom.  Mow both these cover crops after about 40 days.  Then flail mow sorghum-sudangrass again at 60-70 days before incorporating and planting a winter cover crop.

New post-emergence herbicides for 2008
Impact was available in Connecticut last year but proved itself a very effective product on annual grasses and many different broad-leaf weeds in sweet corn.  The strong points of this product are that it now provides a way to kill crab grass that escapes when Duel or other grass herbicides fail to activate due to lack of rain or soil moisture, and it also controls foxtails, barnyardgrass, and fall panicum.  Impact controls most common annual broadleaf weeds except purslane and nutsedge, and will even control problem weeds like burcucumber, jimsonweed and velvet leaf.  The price by the bottle is pretty high but by the acre it is only about $15. 

Option is another new sweet corn herbicide that like Impact is in the same family as Callisto.  The list of annual broadleaf weeds that Option controls is not as extensive as for Impact, however, along with annual grasses Option claims to control perennial grasses like Johnsongrass up to 16" tall and Quackgrass up to 10" tall.  There was no simple way to control these two perennial grasses in the past. 

The third new post-emergence herbicide, called Intensity, is just for grasses but can be used in onions, garlic, potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, carrot, radish, beets, leaf lettuce, most Brassica, spinach, celery, squash, pumpkins, cucumbers, melons and strawberries.

We have no experience yet with either of these last two herbicides so be especially careful to read the full label and observe all caution statements.  

Perimeter trap cropping for cucumber beetle control
One of the best ways to control cucumber beetles on summer squash, cucumbers, melons, butternut and acorn squash is to use perimeter trap cropping.  To use this technique, simple plant 1 to 2 rows of Blue Hubbard squash all the way around your main crop.  Remember you need the Blue Hubbard trap crop on all 4 sides of the field for the system to work.  The idea is to protect the seedling plant from direct damage by the beetles and to prevent the spread of bacterial wilt, which is primarily vectored to the plants before the 5 leaf stage.  To do this, we use the trap crop and border sprays to create a poisoned fence.

The trap crop has to emerge at the same time as the main crop and has to stay healthy up until at least bloom.  So, plant the trap crop on good ground, not in a compacted roadway or drainage ditch where it might not emerge or the seeds may get washed away or drown.  Some folks plant the trap crop on the edge of the outer row of plastic mulch and remove it at bloom, so it doesn't interfere with the main cash crop.  To keep the system simple, use the same in and between row spacing as your main crop.