07/12/06 Tracking potato tubermoth

The Idaho State Department of Agriculture will be setting up traps next month in the potato growing areas of southern Idaho in a search for potato tuber moths. ISDA program manager Ben Simko says this is the follow up to the discovery of some moths last year near Parma and Mountain Home, the first to be found in Idaho since 1959. So far this year there are no moths found in the traps in those hot zones. Simko says they are trying to avoid problems that growers near Hermiston, Oregon and in Washington's Columbia basin have faced because of the tuber moth. SIMKO "It's the larval stage, the worm, it does a little bit of feeding on the foliage but the biggest threat the biggest concern to the industry is that the worm may drop down and start feeding on the tubers in the ground or the female moth will deposit eggs on exposed tubers in the soil and then the worm will mine and tunnel through the tubers and of course that is a significant problem for the industry to have insects, or any additional insect damage on the tuber." There is a website, www.agri.idaho.gov that has plenty of information and updates on tuber moth in Idaho. Today's Idaho Ag News Bill Scott