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Factors Affecting Feeding Injury To Grasses By Adult Billbugs (Coleoptera: Curculionidae), Dale C. Nielson

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

Factors associated with feeding injury to grass plants by two species of adult billbugs, Sphenophorus gentilis and S. parvulus, were evaluated. Early season tests utilized adult bluegrass billbugs while later studies involved wildrye billbugs. Types of feeding injury were determined and preferred feeding locations on host plants were identified for each billbug species. Greenhouse and field studies compared different species of grasses, individual plants within a species, and plants from different locations, for billbug susceptibility. The effect of grass plant age and stem size were also tested using bluegrass billbugs.

Using analysis of variance and multiple comparison tests, significant …