The Citrus Psylla is a sap sucking insect .

2. Asad
Ahmad Sher
Topic;
Citrus Psylla

3. Name
• Common Name:
Citrus Psylla
• Technical Name:
Diaphorina citri
• Famil:
Psyllidae
• Order:
Hemiptera

4. Introduction
 The Citrus Psylla is a sap sucking insect .
 Its belong to Psyllidae family .
 It is an important pest of citrus .
 It is widely distributed in southern Asia and has spread to
other citrus growing region .

5. Identification
 The insect is brown with
its pointed head.
 The nymphs are flat,
louse like and orange
yellow.
 Congregates in numbers
on the young leaves and the
buds.

7. Description

8.  3-4 mm ( 0.12-0.16 in.) in length.
 Mottled, yellowish-brown body with brown legs and a light brown head
 Abdomen of females turns bright yellow-orange when ready to lay eggs.
 Transparent Wings with white spots, or light-brown with a central being
band.
 Very short antennae ( 0.48mm ( 0.07 in.)}, eight yellow segements , and
two shorts hairs at tip.

9.  Five nymphal instars.
 0.25 mm-1.7 mm ( 0.01-0.07 in.) in length.
 Light yellow to dark brown.
 Red eyes.
 Well- deweloped, large wing pads.

10.  Approximately 0.01 –
0.15 ( less than 0.005
in.).
 Bright yellow –
orange .
 Almond-shaped,
thicker at the base , and
taper toward the
opposite end.

13.  Eggs are laid on tips of growing shoots on and between
unfurling leaves.
 Females may lay more than 500 almond shaped eggs during
their lives.
 The total life cycle requires from 15 to 47 days, depending
upon the season.
 Adult may live for several months. But population are low in
winter.
 The Whole development cycle takes from two to seven weeks
depending on the temperature and the time of year.

15. Damage
 Young fruits often drop.
 Citrus psyllids are a vector of citrus greening disease, adisease that causes misshapen,
bitter fruit, ultimately kills the tree.
 Citrus psyllids inject a toxin which stops shoot elongation and deforms leaves and shots .
 Severely curled leaves , premature defoliation is common .
 Twenty –four hours of feeding by a psyllid can cause permanent deformation.

16. Both nymphs and adults suck sap from the plants and
injection of toxic saliva.
Nymphs - are more destructive, crowd on the terminal
shoots, buds and tender leaves.
Excrete honeydew - growth of sooty moulds.
Affected plant parts dry and die away.
It is transmits the "Greening" virus.
Symptoms of damage

17. Host Plants
 Citrus, limes, limons.
 oranges, grapefruit.
 cherry orange.
 orange jasmine.
 Indian curry leaf.
 Chinese box orange.
 lime berry.
 desert-lime.

19. ETL LEVEL :
6 Insect per leaf

21. Management
Biological:
Diaphorina citri can be controlled with a wide range of
modern insecticides.
 Injection of trees with tetracycline antibiotics to control
greening disease.
Natural :
 Lady Bird beetle and Green lace wings are important natural
enemies of citrus Psylla.

22. Chemical:
 Spray Malathion 0.05% or monocrotophos 0.036%
or Carbaryl 0.1% or methyl parathion 0.05%.
 Spray with imidacloroprid SL 40ml/100 of
water.
 Endosulfan EC 200ml/100 of water.
Management