With corn progressing along across Iowa, pests and diseases are becoming more of an issue to be aware of.

Landus Cooperative Field Agronomist Dan Bjorklund says he is starting to see corn rootworm larvae from plant samples from corn on corn fields in Greene County, which he advises farmers to watch those areas for now.

“The reason that it’s important now to monitor as those larvae turn into the beatles then they start feeding on silks. So you want to make sure that we’re not getting silk clipping and that later on when we get to that time of the year.” 

Bjorklund points out the adult beatles for corn rootworm is in July. 

Bjorklund notes that tar spot could also develop as corn matures. He says Iowa State University has an app called Tar Spotter and it can be used on any field as it calculates the recent weather trends and can estimate the probability rating for how much that field could see with tar spot.