Apple blossom: description and struggle with it. Preparations from apple blossoms

Annually many pests annoy gardeners, destroying crops, fruit bushes and trees. Affected plants are covered with spots, their leaves twist, fruits fall. Apple trees and other garden crops are prone to defeat by apple blossoms, the population of which significantly reduces yield and reduces its quality. What are the distinctive features of the beetle and how to deal with it?

Appearance and features of apple blossom

The beetle cvetoed is a small insect of brown color with a long curved proboscis on which the antennae are located. The size of the adult is only about 4 mm. There are two transverse strips on the elytra that distinguish the insect from other species. The beetle has wings that make it very mobile. This affects its distribution through the garden.

The peculiarities of feeding the apple blossom are that it devours the inflorescence, which prevents the formation of the ovary. In addition to apple trees, weevil strikes raspberry and pear.

With the onset of spring heat (about +5 degrees), the beetle cvethopod moves to trees and waits for the flowering period. Before that, he winters in the folds of the tree bark or fallen leaves. The insect does in the kidneys the depressions, from which the juice stands out. In doing so, it lays eggs for the appearance of offspring. The larvae that have emerged inside the flower begin to eat it from the inside, thereby causing the wilting and withering of the inflorescences.

Insect Life Cycle

In the early spring, with a stable air temperature of about +6-8 degrees, adults of apple weevil wakes up, hiding in the fallen foliage or tree bark. When the first buds and buds of flowers appear, females start laying eggs inside. After only a few days, larvae appear from them, feeding on petals, pistils and stamens of a flower. At this point, the fetus can no longer form, and the inflorescence itself becomes brownish and becomes sticky from the larval discharge. The larva lives from 9 to 11 days, after which it turns into a sexually mature individual, ready for reproduction. Found: only 20 female weevils are needed in order to almost completely destroy the crop from the whole tree.

How the affected tree looks

The first sign of the defeat of the tree apple blossom is the kidneys that have not opened in time. Affected areas are easily seen on the background of a green plant. They have an unpleasant brown color and an extremely painful look. Also, affected kidneys can secrete juice, especially in sunny weather. In this case, if you look closely at the affected part of the tree, you can see a small hole through which the beetle laid eggs.

At the end of the flowering period, the weevil-flower-flies can gnaw on leaves, leaving characteristic openwork openings. If you ignore the defeat of the tree, you can remain without harvest, as the insects reproduce fairly quickly and fill the entire garden.

How to get rid of an insect

In a short period of time, the beetle can inflict great harm on garden crops, so it is important to start fighting with it when the first signs of defeat are found. Unfortunately, without modern chemicals it's rather difficult, but it's possible. How to deal with apple blossom folk methods? You can try the following methods:

1. Collection of insects by hand. The technology resembles the collection of the Colorado potato beetle - early in the morning, while the beetles did not have time to hide inside the buds, they should be collected by hand into a bucket full of salt water. This method takes place, but it can not significantly reduce the weevil population. Many of them hide in the bark or on the branches.
2. Lubrication of the trunk and branches with a calcareous solution. Whitewashing does not allow insects to climb trees from the ground, but it is harmless for those who have already settled on the plant.
3. Shaking is done with the help of wooden sticks, wrapped in soft matter, which need to be knocked on the trunk so that the beetles are unhooked from the bark. Previously, under the tree you need to lay a cloth in order to collect them. Apple blossoms can pretend to be dead and lie still for a while, however it is necessary to burn all collected insects.

These methods are used quite often, but the most effective are chemicals.

Preparations against apple weevil

Chemical means are used to destroy a population of insect pests. Spraying against apple blossoms is done during bud blossoming or in autumn after harvesting. The most commonly used drugs are:

1. "Fufanon", the instruction on application, reviews about which speak about its high efficiency. Used in the amount of 10 ml per 10 liters of water.
2. "Calypso" - completely safe for bees, wasps and bumblebees. Diluted with water at a rate of 2 ml per 10 liters of liquid.
3. "Kinmiks" is used not only from weevils, but also from other insects feeding on foliage. Concentration of the drug - 2.5 ml per 10 liters of water.
4. "Tanrek" - not washed off with water during the rain.
5. Carobophos is sprayed with buds on a tree. It is applied from calculation of 10% of substance on 90% of water.
6. The drug "Decis", the instruction for which recommends the concentration of 10 ml per 10 liters of water.
7. "Inta-C-M" - 1 tablet per bucket of water.

These drugs from the apple blossom can destroy the pest population with minimal damage to the plant. Especially gardeners note in the reviews of "Fufanon", the instruction on which application is simple, and the cost is available. In addition, it has a wide range of effects and destroys not only the apple blossom, but other pests.

Preventive measures

As a preventive measure of damage to trees with weevil, such popular methods are used:

1. Overlapping of the hunting belt - for this it is necessary to twist a tight tourniquet from the fabric and lay around the trunk. Matter is coated with a special sweet sticky compound that attracts an insect. When the insect sticks, it is important to remove it and destroy it.
2. Before applying a layer of whitewash, you can clean the tree from the old bark , which can hide beetles. In this way, their population can be significantly reduced.
3. In autumn, after falling leaves, it is recommended to shovel them into a pile and send them to a compost pit or burn them . The fact is that it is in the fallen foliage that the flower-bug beetles can winter.
4. After harvesting the leaves, you can dig up the soil.
5. It is necessary to notice and remove the affected buds and buds on time to ensure that the pest does not spread further down the tree. This will significantly reduce the damage that the beetle can inflict, and will save most of the crop.

Such prophylaxis is good for carrying out in the spring, before budding, or in the autumn, after the leaves fall. Unfortunately, most methods are ineffective in the midst of flowering.

How to properly spray the plant

Most chemicals against the color beetle bug are designed for dilution with water in the proportions indicated by the manufacturer, and spraying with an atomizer. How to properly spray garden plants? The following recommendations should be observed:

1. It is important to properly dilute the concentrate in water, so as not to harm the tree. For this purpose, it is recommended to use measuring utensils and instructions on the product label.
2. Spraying is carried out after bud blossoming, in dry, warm weather, so that wind and rain do not prevent the drug from getting to the affected parts of the tree.
3. Some substances are toxic to humans, so the treatment of garden crops should be done with gloves and a face mask. It is for this reason that it is important to spray at the flowering stage, so that the insecticide does not fall on the fetus that forms.
4. It is advisable to use a spray gun with a long hose to be able to process the top of the tree.
5. It is desirable to spray the drug at a distance of at least 70 cm and not more than 90 cm from the foliage.
6. Spraying is not only foliage and branches, but also the trunk, as well as the earth around the tree.

The correct approach to spraying insecticide on plants will help to destroy pests as much as possible.

Comprehensive struggle

In order to really protect the orchard, it is necessary to approach the struggle against insects responsibly. The best effect can be achieved by applying a set of methods, which consists of agrotechnical and chemical control, as well as prevention.

At the same time, in order to least injure the tree by spraying, experienced gardeners recommend selecting complex chemicals that work not only on the apple blossom, but also on other harmful insects.

Selection of varieties of apple trees, resistant to tsvetodu

All types of apple trees can be divided into several types: weakly resistant, medium-resistant, highly resistant, immune. Gardeners recommend paying attention to the last 2 species, if there is no time, desire or possibility to fight with pests.

Among them, we can distinguish the following varieties - Soyuz, Fairy, Rodnichok, Vasilisa, Palitra, Talisman, Linda, Red Poppy, Prima, Aphrodite, Red Amber. They are highly resistant not only to beetles, but also to many common diseases of fruit trees.

Effectively combining the right types of apple trees with decent care and timely processing, you can get a great and delicious harvest.