Thrips feed on young leaves and flowers using rasping-sucking mouthparts. Feeding on leaves causes a silvery-appearance while damage to flowers causes deformed flower buds, bud abortion, or streaking of petals. Caterpillars A number of caterpillars are pests on garden mums including beet armyworm, cabbage looper, fall armyworm, corn earworm, and European corn borer. Caterpillars can feed on almost all of the aboveground portions of the plant including leaves, stems, and flowers. Adult female moths lay eggs on plant parts which emerge as larvae to begin feeding.
Adults generally migrate to garden mums when they are placed outdoors.
Costs Of Production A knowledge of the costs involved in garden mum production is essential for making decisions on the optimum number of plants to produce and how to establish prices. Costs of production can be classified as either variable or fixed. Variable costs are incurred directly during the production of the crop including pots, plants, medium, and chemicals. These items are usually easy to allocate to a specific crop. Fixed costs are incurred whether or not the crop is produced including salaries, depreciation, insurance, and taxes.