Mealy Bug under control

After an extended vacation, the Pink Hibiscus Mealy Bug is back in the news. But don’t worry, you won’t have to run and hide your plants any time soon, as the Ministry of Agriculture is reporting that their biological measures have worked like a charm. Entomologist Orlando Sosa, says their wasps have been busy wiping out the pink stuff, so much so they’ve stopped releasing them in Belize City. Sosa says you might still see some suspicious signs on your plant life, but that’s actually the white flag of defeat.

Orlando Sosa, Entomologist, Ministry of Agriculture

“People will still see the white stuff, but under all that white stuff are dead Mealy Bugs, which is what we are happy to say. I think with the rains that we are having, the plants are really looking better. You will see that new leaves are coming up and the hibiscus is flowering, which is good news. If it were still infected with the bug, you would find that these plants would not produce flowers; in fact they would begin to shrivel up and die, so we are very happy about this. We find our studies just released the finding of more than 95% reduction in Mealy Bug populations. In fact we are trying to collect some eggs from the female and you can’t find them in Belize City, so that is good news for us. We have an insectory operation going, which is we are producing the wasps in this country, so we don’t have to buy from abroad. That is going very well, today we start our first production of wasps, so we will be releasing in other areas in Belize City. Wherever Pink Mealy Bugs show up, we will be there to release wasps because we know that it works and it works very well.”

As for the rest of the country, the Ministry says they have found a few isolated pockets of infestation in the Cayo District and Orange Walk, but thanks to their wasp producing lab, they should have that situation under control very soon.