Bad year for rice insects?

Here are some extra comments that didn’t make it into Tuesday’s issue of RiceFax:

A BAD YEAR FOR RICE INSECTS? When I first started RiceFax eight years ago, a couple of friends – both cotton consultants – kidded me about publishing a newsletter that covered a crop where nothing ever happened. They knew, of course, that things do happen in rice, but compared to cotton and all the insect pressure it endures, rice often seems sedate.

This is one of those years, though, when rice insects appear to be a bit more volatile and widespread, at least in the Midsouth.

Several weeks ago, Johnny Saichuk started finding heaver-than-normal rice water weevil (RWW) pressure in central Louisiana. Since then, RWW has become a problem all the way into Missouri. Draining fields that far north to curtail RWW pressure happens rarely, but this year at least one field already has been drained. Brian V. Ottis, Rice Agronomist at the University of Missouri’s Delta REC in Portageville, put out an advisory on RWW scouting and treatment options this week.

Gus Lorenz, Arkansas Extension IPM Coordinator, said yesterday that RWW had blown up in numerous fields, and growers were spraying in places where they have not treated before. Nathan Buehring, Extension Rice Specialist in Mississippi, said Tuesday that RWW adults are not hard to find in many of his growers’ fields this season, either.

Lespedeza worms already have over spots in Arkansas this year. Loss of Icon, in part, has complicated both RWW and lespedeza control.

Also looming out there are rice stinkbugs (RSB), which were heavy in wheat and may become a factor in rice. For good reasons, though, nobody is fully predicting that.

RSB populations were heavy in July 2004 in Arkansas and into Mississippi, and it seemed that treatments would be widespread. Midsouth rice had taken a public relations hit the year before because more treatments should have been made that season for RSBs. Missed or delayed applications gave the insect an opening, and in 2003 growers shipped a lot of “pecky” rice to the mills.

So, in 2004 everyone was on their toes. When RSBs started gathering on field edges in July, growers, consultants and dealer reps were poised to pull the trigger. Some treatments were needed and made, but by the time most rice was vulnerable, the insect had taken a powder.

Maybe that will happen this year, too. But the fact that RWW and lespedeza worms already have hit, there is this feeling that one more shoe may drop.

MORE PUMPING, LESS DISEASE? South Louisiana remains dry, and much of the Midsouth is receiving scattered thunderstorms, at best. Drier conditions mean more pumping to build and maintain floods, but dry conditions also reduce disease pressure, a point made yesterday by Johnny Saichuk, Louisiana Extension Rice Specialist.

“Nobody wants to spend any more than they have to this year on diesel to pump water,” Saichuk said. “Those costs, however, might be partially offset by reduced fungicide costs and better yields if it remains dry. The oldtimers used to say that if you pumped a lot during the season you also made more rice. That meant less disease pressure and more sunshine.”

EAST TEXAS FLOODING: Last week, heavy rains caused flooding in areas east of Houston, and up to 18 inches fell in the Fannett community near Beaumont. David Mitchell with M&M Air Service said Monday that some rice was damaged by the flooding. But the water did not blow out levees to any extent, and growers were able to regulate their flood and prevent struggling rice from collapsing onto mud. “The water is all gone now,” Mitchell reported. “Rice yellowed pretty badly, but it doesn’t appear that much of it will be lost.”