Sunflower Headclipping Weevil

Sunflower Headclipping Weevil females are beheading members of the aster family with purple coneflowers being a primary target. Free of their heads, the coneflower stems look like soda straws.

During this week’s BYGL Zoom Inservice, Beth Scheckelhoff (OSU Extension Putnam County) showed pictures of Sunflower Headclipping Weevil females initiating the slow decapitation of purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea, family Asteraceae) in a mass planting on the OSU Ag campus. Reports of this weevil on coneflowers in Ohio have become an annual event.

The sunflower headclipping weevil (Haplorhynchites aeneus) is a well-documented native pest across the Great Plains where they attack cultivated and wild sunflowers (Helianthus spp., family Asteraceae). The weevil reared its ugly snout in Ohio several years ago, but not as an agricultural pest.

The peculiar handiwork of the sunflower headclipping weevil (Haplorhynchites aeneus) is just getting underway this season on purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea) and other members of the aster family (Asteraceae) in southwest Ohio. The damage includes dangling seed heads and stems that looked like soda straws.

The handiwork of the sunflower headclipping weevil (Haplorhynchites aeneus) is just getting underway this season on purple coneflowers (Echinacea purpurea) in southwest Ohio. The damage includes dangling seed heads and stems that looked like soda straws.

Participants in today's OSU Extension, Hamilton County, Master Gardner Volunteers Diagnostic Walk-About at Glenwood Gardens were treated to the handiwork of the Sunflower Headclipping Weevil on purple coneflower. The damage included dangling seed heads and stems that looked like soda straws.