CONTROL OF EUROPEAN RED MITES ON APPLE, 2006

This trial was designed to determine the efficacy of different rates and timings for various new miticides. Two-tree plots were established in a 19 yr old 'Red Delicious' apple block (Brown Block) at the Trevor Nichols Research Complex in Fennville, MI and treatments arranged in a RCB design with four replications. Tree spacing was 18 x 20 ft, with a minimum of one buffer tree and one buffer row separating all plots. Regular foliar maintenance applications of Scala, Procure, Nova, Penncozeb, Flint, Asana XL, Guthion, Lannate LV, Vangard, Ziram, and Mora-Leaf 20-20-20 were applied separately to the entire orchard. In addition, Touchdown, Roundup Ultra and Sinbar were banded under the trees for weed control. Test materials were applied at various timings that included Petal fall+10d (30 May), ERM threshold (2-3 mites per leaf; 27 Jul), and post-threshold (14 Aug) as indicated in the tables. All treatments were applied with an FMC 1029 tractor-mounted airblast sprayer calibrated to deliver 100 gpa at 2.5 mph.