Peach Potato aphid Flashcards
Peach Potato Aphid - order
Hemiptera - the bugs
Peach Potato Aphid - description
Winged or wingless, few mm in length, vary in colour - yellow, green to pink.
Peach Potato Aphid - hosts
Hundreds of plants.
Summer stages - viviparous (giving birth to live young) have multiple hosts.
Winter stage - egg producing- have fewer hosts.
Winter stage hosts - generally plants in Prunus genus inc Prunus persica (peach) and Prunus armenica (Apricot) and P. domestica
In summer aphids leave these hosts and find secondary herbaceous hosts including vegetables in Brassicaceae and Cucurbitaceae families, also cereal crops and ornamental flowers. Broadleaved weeds may also act as hosts eg. Chenopodium album and Convolvulus arvensis. Young growth is most badly affected.
Peach Potato Aphid - carries which virus
Beet western yellow virus, - Chenopodaceae
Potato Leaf roll - Solanaceae
Lettuce mosaic virus - Asteraceae
Peach Potato Aphid - symptoms
Shoots, leaves and flowers become marked and distorted.
Honeydew, secreted as waste product can result in Sooty Mould on leaves and shoots.
Aphids can cause leaf fall and flower drop, also general stunting.
Virus vector via their sap sucking mouthparts.
Can survive mild winters outside and also survive in protected environments.
Peach Potato Aphid - lifecycle
Peach Potato Aphid has incomplete lifecycle.
Colonies in protected environment remain active over winter; outside the population over winters as eggs on woody host.
Moves to herbaceous plants in summer.
Overwintered eggs hatch in early spring giving rise to first generation > wingless viviparous pathenogenetic females produced > migration of winged form takes place in early summer to find new hosts, here more generations of winged and wingless viviparous females occur> final generation will be winged females, they fly back to woody host > mate with male aphids who have also migrated from summer host > black, shiny eggs are laid in early autumn on woody host eg. peach
