Evaluation of egg parasitoid Hadronotus pennsylvanicus as prospective biocontrol agent of the leaffooted bug Leptoglossus zonatus
- Natural enemies to insects, such as parasitic wasps, can help control pest populations in agriculure.
- Identifying the biological and reproductive traits of a natural enemy is important to evaluate its potential success as a biocontrol agent.
- Here, I explore these traits from parasitic wasp Hadronotus pennsylvanicus on host Leptoglossus zonatus.
This work is published in peer review journal,BioControl and can be found here.
Citation:
Straser, R.K., Daane, K.M., Talamas, E. Wilson, H. Evaluation of egg parasitoid Hadronotus pennsylvanicus as a prospective biocontrol agent of the leaffooted bug Leptoglossus zonatus. BioControl (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10526-022-10131-z
- data processing/cleaning
- generalized linear models
- pairwise comparisons
- data visualizations
- R (v3.6.1)
- ggplot2
- viridis
- pipeR
- ggpubr
- survival
- survminer
- lme4
- multcomp
- Rmisc
The western leaffooted bug, Leptoglossus zonatus, is becoming a major pest in California tree nut crops such as almond and pistachio. Feeding damage from these pests can cause significant economic loss for growers. Given the lack of suffient monitoring tactics, broad-spectrum insectides remain the primary control tactic for the pest. Reliance on such methods can be economically and environemental unsustainable. In response to a growing demand from growers for more sustainable management options, we explored the potential utility of parasitic wasp Hadronotus pennsylvanicus as a biological control agent to L. zonatus.
The use of parasitic wasps for the natural control of insect pest populations (biological control) has the potential to provide numerous economic and environmental benefits. If successful, biological control can reduce pest populations, alleviating reliance on commerical insecticides, saving growers time and money all while reducing the negative effects of frequent use of insecticides on people and the environment.
Understanding the demographical and reproductive parameters of a natural enemy is paramount in evaluating it's potential use in biological control programs. Here, we conducted a laboratory evaluation on H. pennsylvanicus as a prospective biological control agent to L. zonatus.
- Clone this repo (for help see this tutorial).
- Until available public, please feel free to contact me for raw data (contact below).
- Data processing and analysis scripts are stored here.
Rob Straser
- email: robstraser@gmail.com
- website: RobStraser.com
- twitter: @RobStraser