Corn Earworm
An active weather pattern is predicted to continue across especially the southeastern and eastern corn-growing region in the next week as a cold front and eventually remnants of a tropical weather system in the western Gulf of Mexico combine across the central part of the country. For corn earworm migration purposes, the overall risks are rather low as the majority of crops are not at a susceptible stage to damage and widespread precipitation may limit moth flights. Some corn earworm moth counts are starting to increase in source regions in the southern United States and mid-south regions, so the potential for increased moth counts does exist especially in the southern and southeastern portions of the corn-growing region in the next week. Low risks are in place tonight mainly across far southeast Missouri, southeast Illinois, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, southeast Michigan, and far southwest Ontario, Canada as a cold front moves east through the Mississippi River valley and into the Great Lakes region. Any moth flights are predicted to occur mainly east of Lake Michigan into the eastern corn-growing region tonight. For tomorrow night into Wednesday morning, a tropical weather system is predicted to move north into Texas. Some southerly winds are predicted to occur east of this feature but widespread precipitation is also expected so the overall migration risk is kept rather low. Still, fields from eastern Kansas into Missouri and into southwest Illinois may see some isolated shorter-distance moth flights. As the low pressure continues to move north into the southern Midwest, additional isolated moth flights may occur further east into Illinois, Indiana, and western Kentucky Wednesday night into Thursday. No additional risks are in place after Thursday morning, but a cold front next weekend may pose at least some migration risk by that time across portions of the corn-growing region.