Tortoise pine scale: a new pest for Southern Italian pines

The Italian stone pine (Pinus pinea L.) is a characteristic Mediterranean plant that became a symbol of the Italian landscape. Many fungi and pests are found on this plant and in the following article we investigate a recently reported species which belongs to Coccidae family. Its scientific name is Toumeyella parvicornis (Cockerell, 1897), also known as “pine tortoise scale”. In the last years, it increased its infestation area in Naples province. Tortoise scale causes several direct and indirect damages to host plants by removing their lymph and producing honeydew. In urban areas, it causes indirect damages to underlying people and things. An important characteristic of this pest concerns its capability to have multiple generations over a single year. T. parvicornis has three nymph stages, and the third stage is the first one to have a sexual differentiation; after that stage, females increase their size until they reach their maturity while males become pupae and then winged adults able to catch females. Some IPM solutions are under investigations because only few pesticides are registered to be used on pines, but they are not very effective against T. parvicornis. Our objective is to reach a perfect natural control, as in areas of origin.