THE CORPORATE Area of Kingston and St. Andrew is being threatened with a flowerless spring, unless the Ministry of Agriculture can move swiftly to save gardens from the plague of so-called "white flies".
Corporate Area residents in sections of Barbican, Hope Pastures, and Liguanea have been complaining for weeks now about the pests. They are in the same order of Mealy Bugs, but from a different family and are commonly called "white flies." But, their real name is "ensign scale" and they bore plants and suck the sap from them. They relish meals of garden favourites including crotons, ixora, bougainvillaea, as well as fruit trees and legumes like gungo and cherries.
The problem with the insects is that they are secured under a shell of wax and travel in large numbers under the protection of their waxy umbrella.
"They are a threat to gardens in the Corporate Area and we've been getting a number of calls, but we don't have a solution right now," Phillip Chung, senior plant protection specialist with RADA, admitted yesterday.
Mr. Chung said the pests have been here for some time and have been sighted in four or five parishes. But, the situation has been getting worse in the Corporate Area probably due to climatic conditions.
He said the only solution the Ministry had found so far was to import a predator bug from the United States, as was done in Kenya. A project has been developed using the bug, for which RADA is seeking financing. In the meantime, affected gardeners are being encouraged to keep using insecticides for three or four applications. RADA is hoping that consistent use of insecticides, at the community level, will help keep them under control until the project can be introduced.
Also, RADA is recommending that in cases where infestation is heavy and insecticides are of little help, gardeners should clip the infested branches from the trees/plants and either burn them or wrap them in plastic bag and leave them in the sun for the heat to kill them.
