Colorado potato beetle
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The Colorado potato beetle (Leptinotarsa decemlineata, also known as the Colorado beetle, ten-striped spearman, the ten-lined potato beetle) is an important pest of potato crops. It is approximately 10 mm (0.4 inches) long, with a bright yellow/orange body and bold brown stripes across the length of its elytra, and it can easily be confused with its close cousin and look-alike, the false potato beetle. The beetle was described in 1824 by Thomas Say from specimens collected in the Rocky Mountains on buffalo-bur, Solanum rostratum. The origin of the beetle is somewhat unclear, but it seems to be that Colorado and Mexico are a part of its native distribution in the south-western part of North-America .
Life cycle
The female beetle can lay up to 800 eggs at a time, and up to three times per year. The eggs are usually deposited on the leaves of potato plants and other related plants in the genus Solanum. After 4-15 days, they hatch into reddish-brown larvae with humped backs and two rows of dark brown spots on either side, which feed on the leaves. Larvae drop to the soil and burrow to a depth of several inches, where they emerge in the spring as adults after two weeks of pupation. They then return to their host plant to mate and feed.
As a crop pest
The Colorado beetle is a serious crop pest of potatoes. Insecticides are often used unsuccessfully against Leptinotarsa because of the beetle's resistance to toxins and ability to rapidly develop immunity to them. In the United Kingdom, where the Colorado beetle is a rare visitor on imported farm produce, it is a notifiable pest: any found must be reported to DEFRA.In Europe
In 1877, the Colorado beetle reached Europe and proceeded to spread over much of the continent. During World War II, the Nazi regime in Germany used them for propaganda, claiming that the beetles had been dropped by the United States Army Air Forces. The Americans were also blamed by regime propaganda when after World War II, in the Soviet occupation zone of Germany, almost half of all potato fields were infested by the beetle by 1950.
Philately
The Austrian postal authority featured the Colorado beetle on a 1967 stamp .References
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