Sixty Seconds with Judi
With all the weirdness in the world right now let’s add Spotted Lanternfly to the mix. If you haven’t heard of them let me introduce you.
Spotted Lanternfly (SLF), is an invasive leaf-hopping insect native to Asia. They moved into Southeastern Pennsylvania somewhere around 2014. They have since become a nuisance to the agricultural community on an epic level. The SLF will eat greedily on crops. They love fruit trees, hardwoods, grapevines, ornamentals and other plants.
It is very important to be able to identify and destroy these little critters immediately. They lay their mud like egg masses in the fall on trees, decks houses, pretty much on anything that is standing still. Each mass will hold 30-50 eggs. They go through a couple nymph stages the smallest are tiny black with white dots. They jump away from you and can be hard to kill. The next stage they change to red and black with white spots. The adults are 1 inch brightly colored moth like creatures with red, black, and grey wings with solid black dots. Even with their big wings they jump more than fly.
Okay, so how do we get rid of them? First be aware. Look for them at the start and scrape away their egg masses if you spot them on trees and surfaces. Smush, stomp, smear or spray these little buggers whenever you see them. There are a variety of homeowner sprays that can be used to remove and kill them. Such as Neem oil, Insecticidal soaps, Spinosad, Malathion and Pyrethrin.
This brings me to how we can help a little. Visit your Pa department of agricultural web site to learn as much as you can or stop into the Linvilla Orchards Garden Center and we can help you with information and products approved for destroying the Spotted Lanternfly.
