Field library

Pyrilla

This is a small pale straw-brown hopper with a pointed snout that lives in crowds under the cane leaves and sucks the sap. The leaves turn yellow and dry from the tips. It drips a sticky sweet liquid on the leaves below, a black sooty mould grows on that stickiness, and the cane loses both weight and sugar.

How to scout

From July to September, in the morning, turn over the leaves of a few canes at several spots; the hoppers jump away when disturbed and the leaves feel sticky and look blackened.