''Thrips palmi'' is an insect from the genus ''

Thrips Thrips (Order (biology) , order Thysanoptera) are minute (mostly long or less), slender insects with fringed wings and unique asymmetrical mouthparts. Entomologists have species description , described approximately 7,700 species. They fly on ...

'' in the order

Thysanoptera Thrips (order Thysanoptera) are minute (mostly long or less), slender insects with fringed wings and unique asymmetrical mouthparts. Entomologists have described approximately 7,700 species. They fly only weakly and their feathery wings are ...

.''Thrips palmi'', melon thrips.

University of Florida The University of Florida (Florida or UF) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in Gainesville, Florida, United States. It is a senior member of the State University System of Florida and a preem ...

IFAS. It is known commonly as the melon thrips. It is a primary

vector Vector most often refers to: * Euclidean vector, a quantity with a magnitude and a direction * Disease vector, an agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen into another living organism Vector may also refer to: Mathematics a ...

of plant viruses. The melon thrips can cause damage to a wide range of glasshouse ornamental and vegetable crops, particularly plants in the families

Cucurbitaceae The Cucurbitaceae (), also called cucurbits or the gourd family, are a plant family (biology), family consisting of about 965 species in 101 genera.

and

Solanaceae Solanaceae (), commonly known as the nightshades, is a family of flowering plants in the order Solanales. It contains approximately 2,700 species, several of which are used as agricultural crops, medicinal plants, and ornamental plants. Many me ...

, such as cucumber, aubergine, tomato and sweet pepper. Adults and nymphs feed by sucking the cell contents from leaves, stems, flowers and the surface of fruits, causing silvery scars and leaf

chlorosis In botany, chlorosis is a condition in which leaves produce insufficient chlorophyll. As chlorophyll is responsible for the green color of leaves, chlorotic leaves are pale, yellow, or yellow-white. The affected plant has little or no ability to ...

. Plants can be deformed and killed in heavy infestations. The pest almost certainly originated in

Southeast Asia Southeast Asia is the geographical United Nations geoscheme for Asia#South-eastern Asia, southeastern region of Asia, consisting of the regions that are situated south of China, east of the Indian subcontinent, and northwest of the Mainland Au ...

, but in recent decades it has been widely introduced and has been observed throughout Asia and the Pacific, Florida, the Caribbean, South America, Africa, and Australia. In Europe there have been outbreaks of ''T. palmi'' on crops in protected cultivation, including several in the Netherlands since 1988 and one in southern England in 2000. These were eradicated. In 2004, there was a report of ''T. palmi'' on an outdoor crop in Portugal. ''Thrips palmi'' has the potential to introduce and spread several non-indigenous plant viruses of the genus ''

Tospovirus ''Orthotospovirus'' is a genus of negative-strand RNA viruses, in the family ''Tospoviridae'' of the order '' Elliovirales,'' which infects plants. Tospoviruses take their name from the species Tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV) which was discover ...

'', which includes tomato spotted wilt virus. ''Thrips palmi'' and the viruses it transmits are not established in Europe, but they continue to present a risk, especially to a wide range of glasshouse-grown crops, and have the potential to cause significant economic impacts. If the viruses were introduced to the UK with imported plant material, thrips species already present there may become vectors, facilitating their spread. ''T. palmi'' is a notifiable pest in the UK, and all susceptible material imported into the country is rigorously checked at points of entry by DEFRA Plant Health and Seed Inspectors. Scientists in Japan report that significant reductions in larva and adult melon thrips occur when plants are illuminated with red light.Katai, Yusuke; Ishikawa, Ryusuke; Doi, Makoto; Masui, Shinichi (2015). "Efficacy of Red LED Irradiation for Controlling Thrips palmi in Greenhouse Melon Cultivation". Japanese Journal of Applied Entomology & Zoology. 59 (1): 1–6. doi:10.1303/jjaez.2015.1.

References

;Notes ;Sources
''Thrips palmi''.
University of Hawaii Extension. * {{Taxonbar, from=Q7798263 Thripidae Insect vectors of plant pathogens Agricultural pest insects Fauna of Southeast Asia Insects described in 1925 Taxa named by Heinrich Hugo Karny