Scientific name: Idiocerus stali
Family: Cicadellidae

DESCRIPTION AND LIFE CYCLE

They are of few millimetres long (3-4), their wings form a roof over their back, they are greenish yellow in the summer and reddish in the winter and look like little cicadas in shape. Their back legs are specially designed for jumping. They overwinter as adults under tree bark, fallen leaves or even in wall cracks. When pistachio buds start to swell, around March, the leaf hoppers climb the trees to feed on them. These insects live for 35-50 days and lay their eggs into the leaf tissue from which the nymphs hatch and resemble the adults but are smaller, wingless and light-coloured. The leafhopper has one generation per year.

PLANT INJURIES

Both adults and nymphs pierce and suck the sap of all fresh and tender tissue of the pistachio tree, causing direct problems by scorching them but mostly indirect problems because of the liquid honeydew they secrete that causes harmful moulds but also because various pathogens can enter through the wounds and lead to the serious problem of panicle and shoot blight in pistachio trees (Botryosphaeria dothidea).

TREATMENT

CHEMICAL

When a large population appears in the early spring, a chemical treatment is recommended

CULTIVATION – BIOLOGICAL TREATMENT

• Reduction of nitrogen fertilisers.
• Installation of yellow glue traps in the field.
• Coating of the bark with Bordeaux mixture (450 g copper sulphate and 900 g quicklime in 7 L water).
• Protection of all natural predators that feed on leaf hoppers and their larvae, such as the lacewing (Chrysoperla carnea), various ladybirds (Coccinellidae) and their larvae, species of the hoverfly genus (Syrphus), spiders and ants.

• 

• 

• 

• 

• 

Reference: Mehrnejad M.R. (2020): Arthropod pests of pistachios, their natural enemies and management. Plant Protect. Sci., 56: 231–260.

Athanasia Chatziperi, Agronomist, Attica Region