Source: NCSU COOPERATIVE EXTENSION, 4/10/18


TSWV virus incidence was higher in 2017 than in previous years due, in part, to warm winter temperatures and spring conditions that maintained winter weed hosts of thrips for a longer time than typical. Read more about tobacco thrips biology and TSWV transmission here.

Because of increased damage due to TSWV infection last year, growers are cautious as we move toward transplant. We have developed a decision aid to provide growers with a sense of potential TSWV risk. The TSWV and Tobacco Thrips Risk Forecasting Tool provides growers with both current year (April through May) and historic TSWV infection and tobacco thrips flight predictions. These predictions are based on over 30 site years of thrips trapping and weather data.

In order to give growers a sense of TSWV risk moving into 2018 transplant, we will be producing twice weekly reports from the TSWV and Tobacco Thrips Risk Forecasting Tool for selected locations around eastern NC where TSWV may be problematic. In these posts, we’ll provide a summary of model outputs to date for each location and suggestions as to how growers might use this information to make management decisions. These predictions will improve as we get closer to transplant dates, and growers should use the most recent information to make management decisions!

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