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Funded Project

Funding Program: Integrated Pest Management Competitive Grants Program

Project Title: Disruption of pear psylla with a sprayable sex attractant: new technology for pear IPM

Project Director (PD): David Horton [1]

Lead State: WA Lead Organization: USDA-ARS

Undesignated Funding: $23,844

Start Date: Mar-01-2014 End Date: Feb-28-2014

Pests Involved: pear psylla Cacopsylla pyricola

Site/Commodity: pears

Area of Emphasis: mating disruption

Summary: Management of pear psylla, a key pest of pears in North America and Europe, requires control of the overwintered adult in late winter preceding bloom. The standard approach for controlling this generation has changed very little since the mid-1900's: oil + insecticide mixtures applied at multiple intervals before bloom. The absence of alternative approaches substantially limits grower opportunities to substitute programs having less reliance on insecticides. The oil component assists in control by causing reductions in egglaying rates and by prompting seasonal delays in egglaying. These effects translate into improved effectiveness of post-bloom sprays. This Project Initiation study will be used to examine whether saturation of orchards with the recently identified sex pheromone of pear psylla can be used to slow male success at locating females for mating. New technological advances by the PI have shown that the pheromone can be applied as a component of the pre-bloom oil sprays, theoretically allowing growers to saturate orchards with pheromone at the very time they are applying their standard oil sprays. If these sprays do indeed interfere with mating success, the psylla population should show four measureable responses: reduced probability of mating and lowered rates of insemination, reduced fertility of eggs, seasonal delays in egghatch, and lowered densities of first generation nymphs. Each of these population responses will be examined in paired disruption and non-disruption plots. Results of this "proof-of-concept" trial will be forwarded to growers at the annual Northwest Pear Research Review attended by pear growers from throughout western North America. Objectives: Objective 1: Reduced rates of mating. Demonstrate that winterform females in plots that have been saturated with sex attractant (disruption plots) will have lower rates of mating and a lower likelihood of insemination than females in non-disrupted plots. Objective 2: Trap shut-down. Show that traps baited with live sentinel females will collect fewer males in disruption plots than non-disrupted plots, due to masking of natural female-produced odors by the synthetic attractant. Objective 3: Lowered fertility of early-season eggs. Demonstrate that the earliest eggs deposited by females as they begin egglaying in late winter are less likely to hatch (i.e., are infertile) in disruption plots than in non-disrupted plots, due to delays in insemination of females in disruption plots. Objective 4: Delays in development of the first generation nymphal population. Demonstrate that the population of first generation nymphs exhibits lower density, delayed development, and a more uniform age structure in disruption plots than non-disruption plots.

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