The Texas Department of Agriculture announced on Tuesday they\u2019re working to remove hibiscus plants from retail stores after invasive pests were found shipped into the state from Florida.<\/p>\n
According to a news release, the cotton jassid \u2014 also known as the two-spotted leafhopper \u2014 was detected in August in multiple locations including College Station, McAllen, Weslaco, Harlingen, Victoria, Cedar Park, Waco, El Paso, and Longview.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe cotton jassid is an invasive pest that feeds on a wide range of host plants, including cotton, okra, eggplant, sunflower, hibiscus, and several weeds,\u201d the news release stated. \u201cHeavy infestations cause leaf curling, yellowing, and plant decline, leading to major economic losses if left unchecked.\u201d<\/p>\n
News of the pest has Valley growers worried. Mendoza\u2019s nursery in Harlingen said hibiscus plants are their top seller.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The cotton jassid was found on hibiscus plants in large retail chain stores like Home Depot and Lowe’s that we’re linked to a Florida nursery.<\/p>\n
The Department of Agriculture is working with Texas A&M AgriLife Extension to help find the pest.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully it won’t get established, but there’s great concern for the area down here \u2014the lower Rio Grande Valley \u2014 just because of the conditions,\u201d Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Integrated Pest Management Specialist Danielle Sekula said.<\/p>\n
According to Sekula, the pest grows in our hot and humid weather conditions. She said she recently detected the two spotted leafhopper in McAllen, Weslaco and Harlingen.<\/p>\n
Sekula said the small pest with two spots on their wings has the power to destroy crops and leave them looking burnt.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou notice the damage first before you see the pest,\u201d Sekula said. \u201cObviously you saw how small this pest so you don’t even notice that you have it. We might have a lot of hibiscus plants that are just gonna up and die and a lot of people will think, \u2018well, maybe I didn’t water it enough.'”<\/p>\n
The 2025 cotton harvesting season just wrapped up in the Valley, but growers are worried the pest could affect next year\u2019s crop.<\/p>\n
Sekula recommends anyone who might have recently bought a hibiscus, and it ends up dying to throw it away in the trash.<\/p>\n
If infestation is suspected, contact the Texas Department of Agriculture at 1-800-835-5832.<\/p>\n
Watch the video above for the full story.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The Texas Department of Agriculture announced on Tuesday they\u2019re working to remove hibiscus plants from retail stores after…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":216593,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[2906,118291,118287,118290,746,118292,118285,118286,878,17929,17928,159,118289,118284,118288,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-216592","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-environment","8":"tag-agriculture","9":"tag-cotton","10":"tag-cotton-jassid","11":"tag-crop-damage","12":"tag-environment","13":"tag-florida-nursery","14":"tag-hibiscus-plants","15":"tag-invasive-pests","16":"tag-pest-control","17":"tag-rgv","18":"tag-rio-grande-valley","19":"tag-science","20":"tag-texas-am-agrilife-extension","21":"tag-texas-department-of-agriculture","22":"tag-two-spotted-leafhopper","23":"tag-united-states","24":"tag-unitedstates","25":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115182309509843300","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216592","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216592"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216592\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/216593"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216592"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216592"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216592"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}