The history of grain weevil problems goes back thousands of years. Scientists have discovered its traces in the tombs of Egyptian pharaohs. The unfavorable feeding situation of this pest is not new, but it is still current. Currently, grain storage is just beginning, and farmers are already reporting problems with the grain weevil.
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How to prepare a warehouse and grain for storage?
Grain weevil – characteristics
The grain weevil is a small beetle with a body length of up to 5 mm. Its color is dark, from brown to black. Adults lay eggs inside the grain kernels, where the larvae then feed until only the husk remains. The adult stage, in turn, most often lives in the deeper layers of the deposit, and when the population is too large, it begins to migrate and only then are the pests detected.
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Importantly, the grain weevil is able to survive at temperatures down to -15°C, so it is not afraid of a mild winter. It is estimated that in Poland this species is responsible for damage to up to 5%. wheat seeds. Its harmful effects include eating grain and contaminating it with feces and corpses. A single individual eats about 0.5 mg of grain per day, while one female can produce up to 8 million offspring during her life, which lasts up to half a year.
Control of the grain weevil
The key to combating the grain weevil is prevention, which means preparing the grain store before the season. The absolute basis is thorough cleaning, which means physically removing the remains of last year's grain and other impurities using a broom or blower. Additionally, it is worth carrying out preventive gassing of the warehouse, which will eliminate all living organisms in every nook and cranny.
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Harvest, harvest and after harvest. The harvest is coming to an end in southwestern Poland
After the grain is placed back in storage, systematic inspection should be carried out. It is worth using traps to detect individual individuals before the population can multiply to a large size. These may be mechanical, sticky or pheromone traps. A more time-consuming solution is to regularly collect batches of grain and conduct simple flotation tests, i.e. pouring water over the sample and detecting the grains eaten by the larvae floating to the surface.
It is assumed that the grain weevil cannot occur in food grain, while in feed grain the harmfulness threshold is 2 pcs./kg. If a pest is detected, spray with deltamethrin or gas the warehouse in the form of tablets releasing phosphine.
