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Carbine insecticide approved for emergency use on lygus bug in confection sunflowers in Manitoba

Manitoba Agriculture, Manitoba Crop Alliance and FMC Canada announced that Carbine insecticide has been approved for use to control lygus bug in confection sunflowers in Manitoba.

The need for an emergency use registration was identified in the wake of the re-evaluation of lambda-cyhalothrin product use in Canada, which left a void in lygus bug control in confection sunflowers. This insect pest is a serious economic threat to human consumption market confection sunflowers.

Lygus bug feed on developing sunflower seeds, which can cause kernel brown spot, a physical scar on the bare seed, and a bitter taste when consumed. Sunflower processors allow only 0.5 per cent damage in physical product. Since tolerance is at an absolute minimum, confection sunflower farmers need an insecticide product to control lygus bug to maintain the quality that is so highly demanded.

Lygus bugs can damage 30 to 35 seeds per head per adult. With the industry standard allowing for a maximum of 0.5 per cent kernel brown spot, the economic threshold for lygus bugs on sunflowers is about one lygus bug per nine heads. In research trials, damage to sunflower heads was approximately twice as severe when infestations occurred at late bud and early bloom compared to stages when heads had completed flowering. Thus, lygus bug management should be initiated prior to or at the beginning of the bloom stage if adult densities approach the economic threshold. Also, fields should be monitored for lygus bugs until flowering is complete to reduce incidence of kernel brown spot damage to confection sunflowers.