NOGALES, Ariz. (WKRC\/CBS Newspath) – U.S. Customs and Border Protection agriculture specialists in Arizona intercepted a rare agricultural pest in a shipment of leafy greens from Mexico, marking only the second documented discovery of the species in nearly seven decades.<\/p>\n
The insect was discovered May 8 during an inspection at the Mariposa Commercial Facility in Nogales. Specialists identified it as Polyamia arachnion Kramer, a species of leafhopper known to damage crops and spread plant diseases.<\/p>\n
According to CBP, this is only the second time the species has been collected and identified in 69 years, with both known specimens originating from central Mexico.<\/p>\n
Officials said invasive pests can pose a significant threat to U.S. agriculture because they can damage crops, spread disease and potentially devastate farms if allowed to establish themselves.<\/p>\n
CBP agriculture specialists routinely inspect commercial shipments entering the United States to prevent harmful insects, pests and plant diseases from crossing the border.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"NOGALES, Ariz. (WKRC\/CBS Newspath) – U.S. Customs and Border Protection agriculture specialists in Arizona intercepted a rare agricultural…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":676001,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47],"tags":[192,79],"class_list":["post-676000","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-environment","tag-environment","tag-science"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676000","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=676000"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/676000\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/676001"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=676000"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=676000"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=676000"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}