Drop-sheeting to understand pest and beneficial dynamics in macadamia

Summary

Pest scouts have developed monitoring techniques to provide reasonably accurate estimations of the pests in orchards. This information, along with other data such as beneficial insect counts, orchard history and the grower’s attitude towards acceptable pest damage levels, is used to determine when pest levels have reached a threshold where a recommendation for action is given. Some pest scouts are starting to use the drop-sheeting technique to determine which pests and beneficials are in the orchard.