Thursday, May 17, 2012

BMSB or not?

While visiting an orchard in Eastern Massachusetts earlier this week, I came across this stink bug sitting on the tip of a peach shoot.
I quickly grabbed it because it looked (initially) a lot like a brown marmorated stink bug (BMSB)! Ugh! I was not sure, however, so I consulted Dean Polk of Rutgers who confirmed it is only a (native) brown stink bug. Good! (Well, they still can cause fruit injury, so good relative to the fact it is not a BMSB.) So, here is a pict of a side-by-side comparison -- you can see the similarity, but the BMSB has more distinct white bands on the antennae. Keep an eye out there for stink bugs so we know if we are seeing more BMSB or not?