Plant guide:🍓 Strawberries
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⚠ Minor🩺
Pests
Tarnished Plant Bug — Catfaced Strawberry Fruit
Commonly affects: Fragaria × ananassa (Strawberry)
Fruit develops a deformed, seedy, bumpy area, often at the tip, where the achenes (seeds) cluster abnormally close together in a hardened, distorted patch.
Potential Causes
- 1Tarnished plant bug feeding on developing flowers and young fruit, disrupting normal seed and fruit development
- 2Bugs most active in spring during flowering
- 3Weedy areas nearby harbouring bug populations
Solution Steps
- 1Keep the area around strawberry beds free of weeds that harbour tarnished plant bugs
- 2Use floating row covers during flowering to physically exclude bugs
- 3Apply an appropriate insecticide during flowering only if populations are severe, being mindful of pollinators
- 4Accept minor catfacing as cosmetic, since affected fruit is usually still edible
Prevention Tip
Weed management around the strawberry bed reduces the alternate host plants tarnished plant bugs rely on before moving into your strawberries.
