Pesky Pests - Monitoring Insect Pests in Alberta

Successful insect management is a team effort. The Alberta Insect Pest Monitoring Network relies on the help of Albertans, including producers, to help monitor crop pests, ensuring the quality of our crops.

Quality assurance, market access, and yield are key to the success of Alberta's agriculture industry. Surveillance and monitoring of insect pests aids in this success by gathering information about established species, populations, and new invasive threats. The information gathered from pheromone traps, field insect collections and counts or damage assessment is used to create forecast maps and make control recommendations, as well as directing insect pest research priorities.

The Alberta Insect Pest Monitoring Network coordinates, manages, and carries out seven insect surveys throughout the province in field crops to assess the impact on the agriculture industry. The success of the network depends on dedicated partners, including Agricultural Fieldmen, Agronomists, and Producers.

How To Get Involved

Each year surveyors set out to count, sweep net and soil sample to gather information for insect survey and population maps in Alberta.

Producers can sign up to participate in the annual surveys by signing up to allow access to their land. Every year surveyors are looking for pea fields in the spring to assess damage for pea leaf weevil, and in the fall, after harvest, wheat fields as they sample soil for wheat midge or count cut wheat stems for wheat stem sawfly. Producers can help by contacting the Alberta Insect Pest Monitoring Network and giving permission to conduct research in their fields. Field visits are carried out with strict adherence to Field Entry Protocol, with the integrity and biosecurity of fields of primary importance.

Producers can also get involved by monitoring for bertha armyworm, diamondback moth, cutworm or cabbage seedpod weevil in their fields, or volunteering a pea or wheat field.

For more information or to participate, contact program staff at shelley.barkley@gov.ab.ca or bugs.r.us@gov.ab.ca
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