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Potato Beetles and what is that?

10 years ago

Its that time of year and the CPBs are doing their thing.
I'm on top of it this year and the potatos are still thriving.

But! The flower stalks are all being cropped by something -- and I can't tell what. Do CPBs cut/eat/chop off the flower buds? I get the feeling they're not even being eaten -- just lopped, because I do find the buds soemtimes on an adjacent horizontal leaf.

If its not CPBs could it be another bug I've seen a lot of: (sorry no pic): very small, roundish and about the same diameter as a CPB if it would be round. If you didn't know it was a bug you'd think it was some tiny piece of bark or leaf duff that landed on the leaf. Its primarily grayish with a touch of black and fairly flat with slight central hump. I've been picking them off and throwing them out of the garden (yeah, I know go ahead snicker). Turns out they can fly too. I rarely see them on the undersides of leaves and the only eggs i've seen are the cpb type.

Any help out there?

Finally, if the potato flowers are not allowed to open (ie as described above) -- will the plant generate tubers? I thought I read a while back that flowering is required for good tuber development.

thanks folks!

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Comments (2)

Kimmsr
10 years ago
Because of gross overuse the Colorado Potato Beetle is developing immunity to most of the pesticides out there. This link, from Cornell, might be of some help.

Here is a link that might be useful: CPB
rokosz
Original Author
10 years ago
Hi, Thanks Kimmsr that helped a little. But I'm still wondering what's lopping the flowers, if lost flowers hurts yield and what that scab-like bug is?

Anybody else have any info?

thanks!
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