Authors: Anthony Hanson, Eric Burkness, & Bill Hutchison Have you seen corn borer or corn earworm this year? UMN Researchers give recommendations, and explain how they use flight data on European Corn Borer and Corn Earworm to help predict the risk of infestation. Fig. 1. European corn borer, ear feeding. European corn borer (ECB) , Ostrinia nubilalis , can cause damage to sweet corn by tunneling through the stalk, ear loss by shank feeding, and tunneling through the ear along with direct feeding on ear kernels (Fig. 1). In most years, the primary concern is feeding damage within the ear, reducing marketability to both fresh-market and processing sweet corn. The multi-generation strain of ECB typically has two generations in Minnesota. Given the number of above-average temperatures this summer, we are at ~225 ECB degree-days (>50F) ahead of 2017, for many locations; as of July 31, >1500 degree-days have accumulated for southern, central and NW MN (F...
