Received from:
Dr. Wayne N. Dixon, Chief
Bureau of Entomology, Nematology and Plant Pathology and Program Manager
Florida Cooperative Agricultural Pest Survey
FDACS/DPI

Late last month, Julieta Brambila, USDA-APHIS, identified an adult male Spodoptera litura (Fabricius), often called the rice cutworm or cluster caterpillar, in a sample from a Miami-Dade County, Florida nursery. See Specimen Report.

Spodoptera litura (Fabricius) is described as a "Potentially extremely serious pest from Asia; destructive to many agricultural and ornamental crops during population explosions; quickly develops resistance to chemical pesticides; listed as of quarantine significance by EPPO, CPPC, NAPPO, OIRSA."

Dr. Wayne Dixon, Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Service - Division of Plant Industry Bureau Chief, provided details on the immediate response from the Florida Cooperative Agricultural Pest Survey team (USDA and FDACS employees) as follows:

"The first, and to date only, Spodoptera litura (male) caught in a trap was just 20 feet from the nursery facility.

"We are dispersing 144 bucket traps with lures over a nine square mile area (16 traps per square mile) centered on the positive trap this week and next. The traps will be monitored weekly through the combined efforts of the Florida Cooperative Agricultural Pest Survey team (USDA and FDACS employees), USDA/APHIS/PPQ and FDACS/DPI for approximately three generations of a S. litura population. Additional traps will be monitored in several other high-risk nurseries in Miami-Dade County and further north to Orange County. Since the first catch of April 2007, traps in place at the edge of the nursery for a research project have yielded no additional rice cutworm moth."

Life cycle images
Australian Fact Sheet