Are you free of weevils? Good for you, but bad for research entomologist Denny Bruck of the USDA-ARS Horticultural Crops Research Laboratory in Corvallis, Ore., who writes:

I have been working with Dutch colleagues to develop an attractant for black vine weevil and potentially other root weevil species as well. As you may or may not know, these insects are a serious pest of the nursery industry and growers have a zero tolerance for them in their nursery stock. We performed our initial field trials in cooperation with growers in 2008 and had very good results. So good in fact that the growers that we worked with last year have very few weevils this year. I need to locate additional field-grown nursery growers with weevil infestations. Having trouble with weevils is not something that growers advertise which makes it a bit difficult to locate cooperators.

Those who have weevils and are interested in cooperating with Bruck’s trials may contact him at 541-738-4026 or Denny.Bruck@ars.usda.gov.