Dry Beans: Flower Pod Fill: Pests and their Damage to Plants

Pests and their Damage—Pod Fill

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White mold
Fusarium wilt
Cut out
Lygus bug

Stink bug
Armyworm
Loopers
Saltmarsh caterpillar

Leafminer
Common bacterial blight
Spider mite
Leafhopper

Use the photos below to identify damage. Names link to more on identification and management.

Click on photos to enlarge

Collapsed, wilting, stunted, yellowing, or dying plants

White mold damage (limas, common beans)
Identification tip: Entire branches or stems decline, resulting in yellow flagging.

Fusarium wilt (of blackeyes) damage
Identification tip: Pale green, flaccid leaves turn yellow and drop off; brown discoloration in center of root, stem, and some branches (seen when sliced).

White mold damage (limas, common beans)
Identification tip: White mycelium on surface of rotted tissue; affected tissue dries and bleaches to pale tan or whitish.

Cut out damage
Identification tip: An aborted blackeye bean bud is a sign of cut-out, caused by water stress, Thielaviopsis basicola, or Fusarium solani.

Damaged pods

Lygus bug or stink bug damage
Identification tip: Lygus distort pods (pods with blanks). Stink bug damage similar, they also feed on beans.

Armyworm damage
Identification tip: Damaged pods have holes chewed in pod (and beans).

Leaves with holes; skeletonized leaves

Armyworm older larva and damage
Identification tip: Older larva chews large sections of leaves.

Loopers damage
Identification tip: Chew holes in mature leaves.

Saltmarsh caterpillar young larvae and damage
Identification tip: Young larvae feed in groups, chewing holes in leaves. Older larvae (not pictured here) feed individually.

Leaves with mines

Leaves with spots

Leafminer damage
Identification tip: Wavy tan leaf mines in surface of bean leaves.

Common bacterial blight damage
Identification tip: Irregularly-shaped spots bordered by a lemon yellow ring; as spots enlarge, tissue in center dies and turns brown.

Water soaking and necrosis on bean leaves, due to bacterial brown spot caused by Pseudomonas syringae pv. syringae.

Bacterial brown spot
Identification tip: Oval spots with dead tissue in the center surrounded by a narrow zone of light-green tissue. The centers of the spots may fall out resulting in tattered appearance.

Hallo blight
Identification tip: Small, angular, water-soaked spots on the undersurfaces of leaves turn brown and develop characteristic light green to yellow halo around.

Leaves with stippling

Spider mite damage
Identification tip: Very fine white or yellow stippling; fine webbing on leaf undersurface.

Leafhopper damage
Identification tip: White stippling on upper surface of leaves; small white cast skins, tiny dark varnishlike spots on undersurface of lower leaves.

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