SCOTLAND'S pollen beetle migration is underway – the weather stations at Coldstream, Haddington, Leuchars and Huntly are indicating that it began last week.

On the UK ‘migration start’ map – which is organised by Bayer – all but five of the 91 weather stations are now red, which means migration is underway.

The warmer weather has triggered the response and around 25 stations recorded the temperature trigger almost all over one day last week.

Rothamsted researcher, Dr Sam Cook, found the first beetle on her pollen beetle trap last Friday, March 10, at which time the tool was showing 13% migration at their nearest weather station Welwyn Garden City.

Pollen beetles were also found in the RIS suction trap catch the day before and Dr Cook says these two findings confirm that beetles are now starting to move into crops.

The five weather stations where migration is yet to start are; Launceston and Plymouth in Cornwall; Haverford West in Wales; and Perth and Dingwall in Scotland. The tool is predicting that migration will get underway in these localities over the next few days.

Where migration has begun, the ‘percent migration’ map is showing the extent of migration ranging from 2% to 17%. Currently the ‘new migration’ map is indicating moderate migration conditions across the whole of Britain.

The pollen beetles do exactly what their name suggests and are attracted by pollen in oilseed rape crops. Problems arise when the beetles migrate before the crop starts flowering and eat the inside of the flowers to get at the pollen – that's when the crop might need to be sprayed to control numbers – however they can be useful in pollinating the crop once it has started flowering.