In this section we will provide information you supply us about your on-going projects so information can be more readily conveyed within this working group.
Posted 6/3/01
New DBM Biocontrol Project for Eastern and Southern Africa
The International Centre of Insect Physiology and Ecology (ICIPE) has started this new project in July 2000 with support from the German Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. The duration of the first phase will be three years, activities are foreseen in four countries in East Africa (Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania and Uganda) and Taiwan. The national research organisations are our main co-operation partners in the African countries and responsible for most of the work on the ground. The Asian part of the project is under AVRDC/Taiwan.
The major areas of work are:
- Countrywide surveys in all four mentioned countries. Documentation of pest status of DBM, collection, identification and impact assessment of local natural enemies;
- Conventional and molecular taxonomic studies of African and exotic Diadegma species.
- Biological studies of local and exotic parasitoids to select for species adapted to African environmental conditions.
- Pilot introduction into, release and impact monitoring of at least one species in Kenya and Tanzania
- Search for and introduction of additional (to Diadromus collaris) pupal parasitoids adapted to tropical lowland crucifer growing conditions in Asia.
Topics 1-4 will be handled by our ICIPE programme in East Africa; topic 5 is in the hands of Dr. Talekar/AVRDC, our project partner in Taiwan.
In addition to the work on DBM on crucifers, we have started to work on DBM on peas, a new host it has switched to about two years ago in Kenya.
It was first restricted to sugar snap peas, moved over to mangetouts and has since become a real problem on the new host. I have just learned that we now have it also on lisianthus (Eustoma grandiflorum), one of the major cut flower species grown for export in Kenya. Progress so far is initiation of the in-country surveys in Kenya and Tanzania, molecular characterisation of Diadegma mollipla collections from Ethiopia, Kanya and Tanzania, development of cultures of a number of local parasitoids and AVRDC in collaboration with USDA Montpellier brought a heat-tolerant Diadromus collaris to Taiwan. This species is currently undergoing studies at AVRDC HQ with Dr. Talekar.
Contact: Dr. Bernard Lohr, blohr@ICIPE.org
Posted 6/14/00
At the beginning of this year, many from around Australia participated in a Diamondback Moth modelling Workshop in Brisbane. A prototype simulation model using DYMEX software was produced and the interest group that has been formed is continuing with research to improve the model and its predictions. The site can be accessed at:
http://www.ento.csiro.au/research/pestmgmt/IPMModellingNetwork/index.htm
Posted: 4/20/00
I was recently in Cambodia and was shown cabbage fields where Cotesia plutellae had been released (by AVRDC) for control of DBM a few years earlier. In fields where chemical sprays were not used (although one Bt spray was applied), the cabbages sustained very little damage. I counted as many as 4 Cotesia coccoons on one plant. An adjacent field where chemical insecticides (mixtures of several things) the cabbages were heavily damaged by DBM (no Cotesia were found).
This was a lowland situation in the Mekong Delta region in the Kien Svay District near Phom Penh. Maybe DBM workers would be interested in this.
Dr. Merle Shepard, Professor of Entomology and Resident Director, Coastal Research and Education Center, Clemson University, 2865 Savannah Highway, Charleston, South Carolina 29414 USA.
e-mail: mshprd@CLEMSON.EDU Phone 843-766-3761 Fax 843-571-4654