An Asian Woolly Hackberry Aphid, Shivaphis celti Das

An Asian woolly hackberry aphid, Shivaphis celti Das (Fig. 1), was found for the first time in Florida in Jacksonville, Duval County, on sugarberry (Celtis laevigataWilld.) on 13 August 1997 by Florida Department of Agriculture & Consumer Services’ Division of Plant Industry Plant Inspector Flewellyn W. Podris. Since then, these Asian woolly hackberry aphids have been collected in counties spanning most of Florida. Shivaphis celti was found in Georgia about a year before its discovery in Florida.

There are several species of Asian woolly hackberry aphids. The East and Central Asian genus Shivaphis contains six described species, of which four are in Shivaphis sensu stricto, and the other two are in the subgenus Shivaphis (Sinishivaphis) (Quednau and Remaudière 1985; Remaudière and Remaudière 1997; Zhang and Zhong 1982). They are found primarily on Celtis spp., with one described species, Shivaphis (Sinishivaphis) tilisucta Zhang, from China on Tilia (Zhang and Zhong 1990). Two more species, included in Shivaphis in older literature, are now in the genus Neocranaphis (Remaudière and Remaudière 1997). These species infest bamboo and closely related plants. No Asian woolly hackberry aphids other than S. celti are known to occur in the Western Hemisphere.