U.S.A. The plant bugs Phytocoris relativus and P. californicus have been shown to cause significant damage in pistachio orchards.
Damage includes lesions, kernel necrosis, and premature nut abortion.
Bugs can move into a nut crop quickly from the natural vegetation surrounding orchards, or from other crops in adjacent fields. Consequently, our objective was to identify attractive pheromones for these insects for potential use in efficient and sensitive monitoring programs. Preliminary investigations determined that virgin female bugs were attractive to males. Comparison of volatiles collected from sexually mature virgin females and virgin males revealed that females produce at least four sex-specific compounds. A series of field bioassays was used to determine that blends of only two compounds were required to aUract male bugs.