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The US seed potato industry has identified PVY as its most serious disease problem and is looking for ways to reduce overall disease incidence below acceptable levels. In Wisconsin, seed potato crops are threatened by infection of PVY, vectored by several species of potato colonizing and non-colonizing species. The dispersal and movement of PVY vectors are influenced by processes operating across different temporal and spatial scales (e.g. climate, weather, or host plant condition). We describe a modeling framework that uses a generalized linear mixed modeling approach to partition the variance associated with aphid capture data. These approaches were applied to long term, multi-site and multi-year, aphid suction trap data sets from the North Central Region, Aphid Suction Trap Network. Variance estimates of aphid abundance among years significantly exceeded similar estimates among locations (regions). This suggests that factors such as season better explain variation in aphid abundance than factors driving differences among locations (e.g. surrounding habitat characteristics). These findings are consistent with the hypothesis that selected aphid species are migrating into fields from moderate to long distances. Taken together, this approach improves our understanding of the patterns of variation in aphid abundance, thereby increasing our knowledge of when the aphid vectors move into susceptible seed potato fields and when they spread the virus to highly susceptible varieties. A more accurate assessment of the phenology of the principle aphid vector flights provides an opportunity to deploy behavioral modifying crop protectants at critical periods to limit the transmission of PVY to potato.<p><p>Keywords: