Influence of soybean and cotton rotation on stink bugs in North Carolina corn

Stink bugs are a pest of corn, and other crops, across the southeastern United States. Across 25 US corn-producing states during 2022, losses attributed to stink bugs were more than five million bushels. Despite a well-developed understanding of stink bug behavior during the growing season, the impact of preceding-year crop rotations on stink bug abundance is still not fully understood. Previous research has shown that crops such as wheat and soybean can influence stink bug populations at a landscape-level. However, gaps in knowledge still remain, such as understanding how preceding years’ crops influence subsequent stink bugs populations in corn across a wider growing region. We hypothesized that fields planted to common North Carolina field crops (cotton or soybean in rotation) the year prior would influence stink bug abundance in corn the following year. We sampled ~120 total corn fields (~60 previously soybean and ~60 previously cotton) across three corn growth stages – pre-tassel, tasseling, and reproductive for the presence of stink bugs in 2022 and 2023. To compare these two rotations, we statistically compared differences in mean stink bug abundance across the growth stages, as well as the peak infestation in any growth stage. These comparisons will not only improve our understanding of stink bug ecology, but could prove instrumental in limiting damage to corn or other early-season crops.