Canola growers at the far south of Alberta will want to note this preliminary update kindly provided by Dr. H. Carcamo (AAFC-Lethbridge) on July 20, 2017 related to flea beetles in canola.....
"We just collected sticky cards from a canola field just east of Stirling that is part of a collaborative study led by Dr. Alejandro Costamagna. I noticed an unusual dominance by striped flea beetles in this field. 15 years ago only 1 out of a 1000 flea beetles would have been striped and the rest crucifer, however, the two fields we sampled today near Stirling AB were unusual. Approximately 48% of the flea beetle population trapped on sticky cards in the one field were striped flea beetles and a second canola field had ~71% striped flea beetles."
Dr. Carcamo goes on to caution that the above observation was based on only a single week of sticky card monitoring. Stay tuned because the entire seasonal data set from these two sites will warrant careful scrutiny! Even so, this update is an excellent example of the importance of in-field scouting and the value of ongoing data collection!
Review previously posted information about flea beetles in canola here.
