I am similarly inundated here in southeastern NY in my own orchard- right now mostly the big green ones. Strangely, I haven't seen them in other orchards I manage but they've been here for about 2 months making a mess of my peaches. I'm seeing them now on the apples- none on the figs and that harvest is nearly over.

Glad I don't make my living selling fruit. Still have plenty of usable fruit for my wife and I. Much of the damage is cosmetic although they also seem to contribute to brown rot. They don't touch the plums for some reason.

I have a ton of those BMSBs. They are making the surface quality of my fruit this year a lot lower. On some trees it seems every fruit I grab to harvest has one of those guys on it. They also did a major number on my fall raspberries.

Just what we need .. another pest.

Scott

Green attracks Stink bugs so use Turnip and mustard greens as host crop. Permethrin spray kill stink bugs 2 hours you can eat greens next day. I live stink bug heaven southeast Georgia if kill on greens here take about 3 years to come back on any crop they come out soybean fields this time year to anything greener soybean leafs are just loosing color in september. I've tried other chemicals it just make sick they recover.

I sorta agree with gator rider. However, here in my area, stink bugs are a continual battle. Even if you kill them one year, they are back the next.

I see the most damage on tomatoes and peaches. I agree pyrethoids seem to do the job on them. I sprayed about two or three times in this later season with a pyrethroid, and now I don't see any more stink bugs. I've found they do cause rot on peaches and tomatoes.

You're right Hman, they do make fruit unsellable. Like squirrels, birds, or any other pest, they can turn a #1 fruit into a cull in 12 hrs.

As an aside, I have to say with all the pests, it's been a good season. I grade the fruit I sell hard (that is, if its got the least blemish, it's a second, and I don't sell it (or sell it at 1/2 price)). It's paid off, no matter how many pounds I've taken to the farmer's market, I've sold out in a couple hours. At times I've had a waiting list (That makes a person feel good about the product their selling.)

Just sold probably the last Autumnstars yesterday (young tree produced about 50 peaches). Beautiful, and taste good. Very large. Over 1/2 lb. a piece. I consider this very large. Best commercial goals are 120 peaches/bu. At over a 1/2 lb. a piece, it figures less than 100 peaches/bu. The guy who bought them was amazed at the size.

Picked O'Henry today. Only 5 on the tree. Very sweet and concentrated flavor.

Indian free only ones left. The tree has about 3 dozen fruit, which are already fragrant. However, this tree appears to be a loser for me. Most of the fruit are split or rotting (despite sprays). Color and size are poor. I've only seen one other peach that's been close to this much trouble. Not been a grower friendly for me, although it's only a second year tree. It's the only peach I have on Citation, which may be a contributing factor (I don't know why Raintree feels it necessary to use all these weird rootstocks.) Even though it appears not to have worked out for me, I thank Scott Smith for his comments on it. If you don't try it, you'll never know.

Scott, I also ordered Early Crawford, and Silver Logan from the Arboreum, based on your assessment (they didn't offer Gold Dust.) I know Silver Logan is supposed to be soft, but heck it can't be any softer than Georgia Belle, and I sold a bunch of them this summer (but I have to admit, they made me fightin' mad how easy they dropped and bruised.) When I get a another tree that produces enough to fill in that slot, Belle of Georgia is gone.

Olpea, while Silver Logan is an excellent peach it is in my top category of prone to rot, much worse than Indian Free. I hope you have better luck, it produces gargantuan fruits of exceptional beauty and taste which you should be able to charge a premium for if you get them to harvest. I have planned on removing it for several years now but its like a favorite racehorse with a broken leg, I just can't shoot it. I am not using any powerful anti-rot sprays so maybe with some MFF it will be possible for you to control the rot.

Early Crawford has been a fine peach with no particular problems. It has a big seam which may look funny to people but once they taste it they will be enlightened. Productivity is low.

My Indian Free are coming in now very nicely; a few next to the Sweet Bagel (a rot magnet that is getting topworked soon) are rotting but the others are doing great. Too bad that one didn't work for you.

If you want a late-season white peach the Oldmixon Free sold by Vintage Virginia apples (which may not be the real thing) is an excellent white peach I would say is every bit as good as Silver Logan. It ripened about two weeks ago for me. No rot or other problems and fruit almost as large as Silver Logan. I don't know of any earlier exceptional white peach, my Raritan Rose fruited this year and it was good but not as good as Silver Logan.

Scott

Well, that's not encouraging, but thanks for the straight dope.

Perhaps my only hope is that it is listed as a mid-season variety. Assuming that means sometime around Redhaven, that's the driest part of our season (last part of July/first part of August). Indian Free ripens sometime in Sept. when the rains generally start to pick up. Plus, the dew seems heavier with the cooler Sept. nights. I don't know if those conditions mimic the east coast or not.

I think I'm going to try to do a better job on sanitation next year too. It's too easy to pull culls off and squish em', but I can see that causes lots of innoculum on the floor. I think I can do a better job on that end.

Who knows, despite a lot of effort, Silver Logan may be a no go. If these varieties don't work out, I've lost 20 bucks a pop. Big deal, people blow more than that for a restaurant outing.

I went ahead and ordered an Early Crawford because I noticed at least it used to be a commercial variety on the East Coast, as well as in KS, 100 years ago. In terms of poor productivity, do you get a lot of new wood with no fruit, or is it that the tree won't size a crop, or do you have problems with low vigor so that it puts on very little fruiting wood?

I think I'm covered on late white peaches for the time being. I've ordered Blushingstar (+25 Redhaven) and Lady Nancy (+30). Still, if Silver Logan turns out to be an exceptional flavor for me, I may try Oldmixon Free for a late white peach.

Olpea, my Early Crawford has only set for two years so that comment is more based on closely related varieties such as Foster which I have more experience with, as well as the perceived wisdom, Peaches of New York in particular. These varieties have plenty of vigor but can drop a lot of fruit early on. Peaches of NY also mentions that it is not consistent in fruit set from year to year. I will know a lot more in a few years.

I have gotten good Silver Logans every other year so it strongly depends on the weather; this year we were solid rain during its ripening period and they all rotted. I need to take it out because I need to reduce the overall rot level in my orchard. This Sweet Bagel peach is driving me nuts now, its a huge tree that had hundreds of peaches a few weeks ago and I have had to pull the rotten ones off one by one; every time I look at it there are half a dozen more to pull off. So it has been spreading spores for two solid weeks now and I can't afford that kind of tree.

Scott

Back to stink bugs....

I'm also inundated with them this year. Twice as many as last year, and that was twice as many as the year before. I've only been in my place for 5.5 years but I never remember seeing these guys until about three or so years ago. Since then they've grown exponentially and seem to be a 3 season bug. Actually 4 season, because I kill them all winter long inside the house. Big fun at Christmas!!

Does Imidan work on them? I have a lot of that stuff and wouldn't mind breaking out the heavy artillery.

Before frost comes you need very green crop to attrack stink bugs maybe to late grows green crop in your zone best results for control on low growing crop like turnip are mustard. First even light frost that ends stink bug movement for feeding. Hinding take over in all directions any building any tree with hinding places knot holes bark cracks eve on house cracks in door ways screen cracks so many places hard to find all green patch easier at feeding time.

I don't think trap crops work well for stink bugs. They migrate easily from the trap crop to fruit. At least that's been my experience.

Imidan is indeed a big gun, and although apparently a cracker jack against beetles like plum curculio, it has low performance against plant/stink bugs. Additionally, it has such a long PHI, it makes it difficult to use later in the season.

In spray guides, pyrethroids are rated best against stink bugs, which mirrors what I've seen. The problem is that they also have a long PHI for tree fruit. This year, I used a pyrethroid on my to tomatoes which only has a 1 day PHI and a neonicotiniod (Assail) on tree fruit (7 day PHI). Assail didn't work as well as the pyrethroid in my opinion. I think taking care of the stink bugs on tomatoes, helped the tree fruit as well.

The thing that worries me about neonicotinoids is that they've been substantially implicated with honey bee die off. It appears that plants that have been sprayed can exude it in dropletts that the bees drink become disoriented and fail to make it back to the nest. They are neurotoxins.

They are now widely banned in Europe as a result and there is currently intense lobbying to have the same done here. In areas of Europe where the bans have taken affect there has apparently been sudden drastic improvement in the survival of honey bees.

Guess I'll stick to pyrethroids for stink bugs unless this research is debunked.

Hman,

I think I read the same info you did (linked by a Nafex member).

To me, the evidence seems pretty anectodal. A few countries banned neonicotinoids and bee populations supposedly stabilized (I'd like to see the statistics from countries that did not ban neonicotinoids.)

Regarding the article, I must say, it is poorest research correlation I can think of. There are so many variables affecting bee health, to assume there is a linkage b/t neonicotinoids and colony collapse disorder without isolating any other variables leaves so many questions, it renders the conclusions worthless.

I can remember when people where convinced GM plants were the culprit of CCD (I mean really convinced.) Strangely, that hypothesis has fallen out of disfavor.

The Sierra Club has taken advantage of the opportunity and is lobbying congress to ban neonicotinoids. You know as well as I, the Sierra Club would ban every pesticide they could, if they had the power.

I'm not saying we should dismiss the possible causal relationship (of neonicotinoids and CCD) rather, wait for real research to answer the questions.

If neonicotinoids are demonstrated by research to cause bee disorientation on non-blooming crops, and thereby implicated in CCD, that's one thing. But so far, the loose linkage leaves a lot of doubt in my mind.

Lastly, one other piece of the puzzle that leaves me skeptical is that some neonicotinoids (ex. Assail) are registered as Reduced Risk Pesticides by the EPA. The primary criteria are low impact on the environment (i.e. bees) and low mammalian toxicity. There has been extensive research done to be able to register these compounds as Reduced Risk Products. I'm not saying more research shouldn't be done, but I'm unwilling to accept loose correlations in favor or conclusions from hard research.

The information I base my caution on was summarized in HortIdeas. Europe doesn't tend to summararily ban specific pesticide use based on rumor although they function under a standard less influenced by industry lobbyists, and the burden of proof to induce a ban is smaller than here.

It is more than the Sierra Club trying to bring a ban. Others include a large association of bee keepers and groups not automatically associated with antipathy towards all synthetic pesticides.

The article said that Italy initially rejected a ban but eventually decided to test in in one specific region where bee populations instantly rebounded. In other areas there was much more than a loose association of rebounds of honeybees with such bans.

I'm not suggesting evidence is conclusive or even to have the knowledge to accurately assess the the evidence that exists. However, if I can get similar results with pyrethroids, I'll risk mite flare-ups instead of bee kill when eliminating my SOB SB's.

HortIdeas does have a decidedly anti-synthetic slant although they are open minded to research on both sides.

Thanks all for your thoughts. Regarding neonicitinoids I heard an interesting talk at the Eastern Apicultural Society meetings this summer by Denis van Englesdorp. After seeing a new film, 'The Vanishing of the Bees', which was concerned to insinuate that neonics are the cause of CCD, I heard Denis (who was interviewed on it, though not regarding this issue) give the plenary address the next morning where he held that the most recent research is tending to the hypothesis that some kind of virus is responsible for CCD. One can draw one's own conclusions but it is certainly not unreasonable to think that some are hijacking the CCD problem as a weapon against pesticides. Still, this is not to say that such pesticides are not a problem and it is quite possible that they exacerbate the problem of CCD (just like smoking crack would no doubt exacerbate AIDS if you were unfortunate enough to have it).

As for stink bugs the last few cool nights seems to have had some effect. I just harvested my Asian pears as the buggers launched their attack and seem to have escaped with little damage and just harvested my Ichi persimmons, and again got them in time to avoid too much damage. My next fruit tree purchases are going to be for fruit that matures early and fruit that matures very late.

Hman,

I understand where you're coming from. A person should use only what they feel comfortable with. For my part, one test ban, for one year, in a portion of Italy is too far from hard science to accept as good evidence.

You're right, various U.S. beekeeping groups have written congress about neonics. This seems to me somewhat ironic, considering the pesticides they use to fight their own pests. But I don't necessarily blame them for jumping on this. They've been through the ringer with hive losses. Desperation doesn't necessarily breed patience, especially when livelihoods are at stake.

Universities and the EPA have maintained neonics are much safer for bees than organophosphates, pyrethroids, or carbamates. So until new testing overturns that, I'll have to conclude neonics are the safer option. I've got a neighbor with bees (which I'm grateful for) so I want to use good practices.

As I mentioned, I do use a pyrethroid, even though it's supposed to be extemely lethal to bees (and I agree it is the best option for stink bugs if one can meet the PHI). But I never see bees drinking dew off tree foliage regardless of what I spray (There's a few ponds close by, so perhaps that's where they get their water.) Of course I'd never spray any of these products at bloom.

BTW-I don't think we have the new stink bug here yet. New pests seem to start on the East or West coasts, and migrate toward the middle.

Olpea, the "dew" I've read about occurs on corn and other annual vegetables and I've never heard of it being exuded by fruit trees. I don't question your logic or conclusions and our intentions are the same. You seem to have more information on the subject than I do. I will digest this and whatever information comes to me over winter and make decisions in spring on how to deal with these horrible insects.

It is interesting how they have not appeared on the more tamed landscapes of my clients, suggesting to me that my borders of broadleaf weeds such as plantain, multiflora rose, various wild brambles, etc. etc are sustaining my high poplulation.

Perhaps I should limit my landscape as much as possible to grass and trees and see if my population of big green stinkers doesn't decline.

Are these bugs a new pest in the U.S.?

Although the big green ones are what I'm seeing now there were much smaller ones on my peaches earlier which were black with other markings I can't remember now. It was the first year they've been a problem as well. It seems I've seen the green ones before and for several years back but these others were new to me.

Apparently the brown marmorated stink bug is new. There was a good article on them put out by Cornell earlier this summer (See Below).

They recommended the pyrethroids - Warrior and Danitol, or Thionex (Endosulfan). However, Endosulfan is being phased out by the EPA. It can be used on stone fruits until July 31, 2012, and can be used on apples till July 31, 2015.

It'll be interesting to see if you can cut damage by taming the landscape. Please post what you find.

Here is a link that might be useful: Scaffolds - Bad Eggs Stinkin Up the Place

It appears from the article that I may only have to wait for droughts end and in a normal year they may stay with non-fruit hosts.

If I try to eliminate these hosts I'll have to do so as soon as harvest is over (I also have a lot of mullein) and try to starve out the local population. Unfortunately this will also be fatal to some of my local pollinators who enjoy the flowers of some of the SB hosts. Maybe I'll just wait till early spring and try to focus on eliminating all weeds known for SB association. Have to wipe out my stand of raspberries as well.

Tough business growing fruit, huh?

Yeah. This season, I've pulled out 10 trees that didn't work out, and 4 more need to go.

A neighbor that I gave a few peaches to, saved the pits and wants to plant them to start growing peaches. I can tell he has the same idea I used to have when I first started - plant trees and harvest fruit.

If I could only explain all I've been through.

I can't, so as the cartoon penguins say, "just smile and wave boys, smile and wave."