CSFB and insecticide

willy

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Rutland
just using my limited brain power to try and draw some conclusions about csfb. Around me loads of farmers are seeing problems and yet all bar a1 ha out 200 has any signs.

Now the only difference I know on my farm is that I have used hardly any insecticides for csfb control in the autumn. However on a contract farm I do I did and this is showing signs.

So is this the point that leave them in the autumn and predators will get on top of it (I haven’t sprayed for 3 seasons on my bit.

Yet people I know sprayed 5 times and are now writing crops off or already have done.
 

Brisel

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Midlands
just using my limited brain power to try and draw some conclusions about csfb. Around me loads of farmers are seeing problems and yet all bar a1 ha out 200 has any signs.

Now the only difference I know on my farm is that I have used hardly any insecticides for csfb control in the autumn. However on a contract farm I do I did and this is showing signs.

So is this the point that leave them in the autumn and predators will get on top of it (I haven’t sprayed for 3 seasons on my bit.

Yet people I know sprayed 5 times and are now writing crops off or already have done.

There is much that I don't understand about how this pest works, but I agree with your sentiment. If a spray is going to do less than 50% you are creating a junkie crop with no natural protection by spraying out 100% of the beneficial insects. I have 14 km of beetle banks in my fields yet the severe pressure last autumn still meant I lost some plants close to them but so far, like you, I seem to have escaped the worst compared to my neighbours who spray every year, and several times last autumn.

Just to contradict myself, I did do one dose simply because even a 50% reduction was better than nothing - I can't have been alone in thinking this. That was the first insecticide I have applied to cereals and osr since 2015 but I do use Deter treated seed in wheat. Next year I will let nature take its course instead.
 

Cropper

Member
Location
N. Glos
I’ve been thinking the same myself.
I didn’t spray mine last year, one field didn’t get away from the beasts at establishment but the field that did isn’t looking too bad, 25-50% of plants with larvae in and not going to do much but the remaining plants growing well now at yellow bud.
CSFB larvae have to crawl around the soil and into leaf petioles so will be vulnerable to any predator that likes to eat little grubs.
Multiple pyrethroid sprays in the autumn not going to help populations of insect predators and thus larval burden is greater.
Last summer was good for insects, i.e. hot and dry, perhaps a more normal wet August might drown some of the adults.
Whatever happens I don’t think the answer is going to come out of a can.
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
it's a long time since we used insecticides at all - coincidence that CSFB and BYDV hasn't been an issue here ?

more research desperately needed but its does seem that if you can create a natural balance things generally look after themselves better

At the the BASE AGM Jackie Stroud mentioned research that connected worm numbers to reduced BYDV which makes interesting reading

without doubt many insecticides products are being horribly over used
 

Two Tone

Member
Mixed Farmer
it's a long time since we used insecticides at all - coincidence that CSFB and BYDV hasn't been an issue here ?

more research desperately needed but its does seem that if you can create a natural balance things generally look after themselves better

At the the BASE AGM Jackie Stroud mentioned research that connected worm numbers to reduced BYDV which makes interesting reading

without doubt many insecticides products are being horribly over used
I went to Lodders Rural Conference earlier this month. One of the speakers was Dr Alastair Leake from the Game and Wildlife Conservancy Trust Farm in Leicestershire.

He claims that there is far less (if any) CSFB in No-till drilled fields. The reason he thinks this is the case is that spiders are far less disturbed and can quickly reestablish their webs between the remaining surface straw stubble. He doesn't think spiders eat the CSFB. But as they are caught in the webs, they cannot escape and other predators then eat them.

Would you concur @Clive?
 

spikeislander

Member
Location
bedfordshire
I think I’m knocking osr on the head due to 100% failure , luckily most done up in autumn and recropped .
But if I do /did I would 100% NOT waste time /money on any insecticides !!
Only thing I might consider is a garlic spray or similar anything else you might as well go to the pub with the money saved.
This sentiment has been echoed by two separate ( honest) agronomists ( they do exist) over the last few weeks .
 

B'o'B

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Rutland
I went to Lodders Rural Conference earlier this month. One of the speakers was Dr Alastair Leake from the Game and Wildlife Conservancy Trust Farm in Leicestershire.

He claims that there is far less (if any) CSFB in No-till drilled fields. The reason he thinks this is the case is that spiders are far less disturbed and can quickly reestablish their webs between the remaining surface straw stubble. He doesn't think spiders eat the CSFB. But as they are caught in the webs, they cannot escape and other predators then eat them.

Would you concur @Clive?
Most of our no-till rape didn't look too bad - until stem extension started. There was a few grubs in the petioles but not huge numbers, but now stem extension has started there are some sizeable areas of the field where a grub has gone up the stem and burrowed in near the top of the main raceme and made the plant very unhappy. This year planting early seems to have been the best defence in this area, we hung on until September to drill hoping the CSFB would stop flying but they were still easily found in the garden in November. Neighbours earlier crops which were subsoiled in have coped much better with the pressure.
 

Zippy768

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dorset/Wilts
Or have people been following "thresholds"?
So 50% of a larger population of flea bettle were controlled leaving the other 50% to continue to feed. This maybe leads to a smaller, maybe weaker, plant through the winter. Fast forward to spring and the larvae are going to town on a less strong plant.

Another farmer with mild shotholing chooses not to spray - because it didn't need it. His grows well in the spring. Thresholds were just lower.
 

Zippy768

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dorset/Wilts
it's a long time since we used insecticides at all - coincidence that CSFB and BYDV hasn't been an issue here ?

more research desperately needed but its does seem that if you can create a natural balance things generally look after themselves better

At the the BASE AGM Jackie Stroud mentioned research that connected worm numbers to reduced BYDV which makes interesting reading

without doubt many insecticides products are being horribly over used

So once you stop using insecticides, did you see an increase in BYDV initially before it begain to reduce as a problem for you?
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
I went to Lodders Rural Conference earlier this month. One of the speakers was Dr Alastair Leake from the Game and Wildlife Conservancy Trust Farm in Leicestershire.

He claims that there is far less (if any) CSFB in No-till drilled fields. The reason he thinks this is the case is that spiders are far less disturbed and can quickly reestablish their webs between the remaining surface straw stubble. He doesn't think spiders eat the CSFB. But as they are caught in the webs, they cannot escape and other predators then eat them.

Would you concur @Clive?

Certainly true that you get a lot more spiders so logic seems sound

There is certainly something going on which is letting me get away with no insecticide use - I can’t just be lucky
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
So once you stop using insecticides, did you see an increase in BYDV initially before it begain to reduce as a problem for you?

No - BYDV has simply just not been a problem and same re CSFB ........... so far

No seed dressings either

Have heard several plausible explanations why but nothing conclusive - possibly a combination of several things maybe

More research certainly required in this area that’s for sure
 

DrWazzock

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lincolnshire
Most of our no-till rape didn't look too bad - until stem extension started. There was a few grubs in the petioles but not huge numbers, but now stem extension has started there are some sizeable areas of the field where a grub has gone up the stem and burrowed in near the top of the main raceme and made the plant very unhappy. This year planting early seems to have been the best defence in this area, we hung on until September to drill hoping the CSFB would stop flying but they were still easily found in the garden in November. Neighbours earlier crops which were subsoiled in have coped much better with the pressure.

Same here. Neighbour's crop which was subsoiled in early (mid August) looks a lot better than ours right next to it which was direct drilled at the end of August ,although ours is a semi dwarf variety just to complicate things. I have found a few larvae in the stems of ours but not more than one in 25. I used insecticide on one small area of the field that we did min till and was hammered by beetles at the cotyledon stage. Insecticide made little if any perceivable difference.
 
I have notilled since 2012 and not sprayed rape or cereals with insecticide for 25 years
This year I lost one block of osr and 3/4 of another block
Csfb came in over one weekend and wiped out the seedlings

I have spread out blocks so have plenty of csfb coming from neibours
 

Two Tone

Member
Mixed Farmer
No - BYDV has simply just not been a problem and same re CSFB ........... so far

No seed dressings either

Have heard several plausible explanations why but nothing conclusive - possibly a combination of several things maybe

More research certainly required in this area that’s for sure
Is your Un-dressed seed grown on from seed that was dressed?
If so, many say you can get away with it. I used to do it when I had a grain store with a good cleaner.
As I don’t have one any more we need a mobile, so might as well treat it at the same time.
 

Clive

Staff Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lichfield
Is your Un-dressed seed grown on from seed that was dressed?
If so, many say you can get away with it. I used to do it when I had a grain store with a good cleaner.
As I don’t have one any more we need a mobile, so might as well treat it at the same time.

No I grow the same seed year after year - buy in a bit new for new varieties etc each year


It’s all tested though so I know not to dress not just wing and a prayer !
 

Two Tone

Member
Mixed Farmer
No I grow the same seed year after year - buy in a bit new for new varieties etc each year


It’s all tested though so I know not to dress not just wing and a prayer !
Seedlab 100 is only 15 miles away in Stratford. Reckon I shall be doing the same from now on now we have lost Deter.

Shame we can’t do so with Hybrid Winter Barley. But the price gap between it and wheat is now so large, I might not grow any.

In fact, if I’d got Undrilled spring Barley in the shed, I’d probably send it back.
We export so much Barley to EU countries, it is too risky to grow it from now on.
 

Adeptandy

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
PE15
it's a long time since we used insecticides at all - coincidence that CSFB and BYDV hasn't been an issue here ?

more research desperately needed but its does seem that if you can create a natural balance things generally look after themselves better

At the the BASE AGM Jackie Stroud mentioned research that connected worm numbers to reduced BYDV which makes interesting reading

without doubt many insecticides products are being horribly over used

I appreciate what your saying, and I’m not using insecticides here, but not convinced you’d get the same results In Cambridgeshire, very much a lottery here as to what survives CSFB
 
The genes for resistance to CSFB and their larvae must exist in the brassica genus or they would all have perished by now. The trick will be to locate them and either breed them in or use genetic modification.

The same goes for BYDV resistance in cereals. Genes that code for total resistance to BYDV must exist somewhere in the gramineae family somewhere.
 

Barleymow

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Ipswich
I went to Lodders Rural Conference earlier this month. One of the speakers was Dr Alastair Leake from the Game and Wildlife Conservancy Trust Farm in Leicestershire.

He claims that there is far less (if any) CSFB in No-till drilled fields. The reason he thinks this is the case is that spiders are far less disturbed and can quickly reestablish their webs between the remaining surface straw stubble. He doesn't think spiders eat the CSFB. But as they are caught in the webs, they cannot escape and other predators then eat them.

Would you concur @Clive?
I still plough and the fields are still covered in cobwebs amazing how quickly there made
 

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