Caterpillars
Identification tip: Leaf edges chewed.
Foliage may be webbed or tied together with silk. Fruit
injury varies from oval craters to scattered gouges in the
skin.
|
Persea mites
Identification tip: Leaves bleached, bronzed,
spotted, or stippled. There may be pale silken patches,
but no black excrement, on underside of leaves. |
Thrips
Identification tip: Fruit with brown
scars, leaves with pale stippled, bleaching, or black
excrement on plants. Damage and signs vary depending
on the species
of tiny, slender thrips.
|
Other leaf-chewing invertebrates
Identification
tip: Notched, chewed, or missing foliage not caused by caterpillars.
Beetles, earwigs, grasshoppers, and snails are relatively uncommon or are a concern
only on young trees.
|
Avocado lace bug
Identification tip: Leaves bleached or
stippled (resembling mite feeding) and brown dead leaf blotches.
Black excrement on underside of leaves from sap-sucking
bugs. |
Plant sap-sucking insects
Identification tip: Sticky honeydew, blackish sooty mold,
whitish wax, or trails of pest-tending ants. Infestations
of mealybugs, scale insects, and whiteflies indicate that
biological control has been disrupted as these Homoptera are especially well controlled by parasites and predators.
|
