HUNTINGTON, Ind. — Last May a homeowner from eastern Huntington County, just south of Fort Wayne, captured a bug at her house. As it was an insect she had never seen before, she was curious enough that she took the brown-and-gray-speckled creature to her county extension office for identification.

Huntington County agriculture and natural resource educator Ed Farris told her his suspicions it was a pest first discovered in Indiana in October 2010. He sent the specimen to the pest diagnostic lab at Purdue University to have it positively identified.

Sure enough, it was a brown marmorated stink bug – the first to be positively identified in Huntington County. So, Farris published an article alerting the public to the threat of the crop-eating pest.

“The bug in its adult stage has the shape of a shield common to most stink bugs,” Farris wrote. “The upper body is mottled brown and gray with alternating light and dark bands on the edges of the abdomen.” He described the size of an adult as approximately 5/8-inch long and 3/8-inch wide.

“They are capable of feeding on a lot of different crops, tree fruits, apples, peaches,” said Rick Foster, an extension entomologist at Purdue. Further, he said university entomologists have learned of damage to soybeans, sweet corn, tomatoes, peppers and similar produce.

Back in May, Foster told Farris that specialists at Purdue were anticipating that brown marmorated stink bugs would become a pest in Indiana homes before their numbers build up to become a serious crop pest.

Meanwhile, at the University of Kentucky (UK) College of Agriculture, extension entomologist Ric Bessin has been getting calls from various county agents as well as the general public saying they have seen the stink bugs in their homes.

Bessin said around September people begin to see these pests and smell the cilantro-like odor they emit under duress.

In April they will move into wooded areas and then into crops. As in Indiana, the stink bugs were first discovered in Kentucky four years ago.

Back in July Doug Johnson, another UK entomologist, warned farmers the stink bug is mainly a threat because of its ability to develop very large populations. Bug-to-bug, they are similar to other brown or green stink bugs, he wrote, but the populations tend to be much larger.

“Like other stink bugs, BMSB begin moving into soybeans as they start to bloom and populations grow to their largest numbers as the pods are forming and filling,” Johnson added.

According to Bessin the best thing homeowners can do to prevent stink bug problems is to pest-proof their residences. They should seal off openings into the house where wires and pipes enter the building, as well as any cracks or tears in window screens and doors. Homeowners may also want to spray an insecticide around openings in the exterior of the house.

Foster has suggested the most effective insecticides for BMSB are pyrethroids such as bifenthrin, cyhalothrin, cyfluthrin and cypermethrin.  However, he explained most fruit crop growers prefer to avoid using these insecticides because they kill natural enemies that keep mites under control.