Location: Commodity Protection and Quality Research
Project Number: 2034-43000-043-058-S
Project Type: Non-Assistance Cooperative Agreement
Start Date: Jun 1, 2023
End Date: Jun 30, 2024
Objective:
The overall goal is to quantify and improve field performance of mass-released navel orangeworm (NOW) for sterile insect technique (SIT), and to develop best practices for area-wide pest management programs utilizing NOW SIT. Objectives addressed by the cooperator in this agreement include: improved tolerance of shipping conditions; development of pupal irradiation; impact and movement of sterile NOW in large field blocks; and improved estimation of overwintering abundance as part of integration in an area-wide management program.
Approach:
Improved tolerance of shipping conditions will be addressed using mark-release-recapture trials in small experiment station plots to compare a standard strain with a newly developed strain.
Pupal irradiation will be examined using laboratory studies to develop methods to reliably obtain mature pupae, and then determining the relation between pupal x-ray dose and subsequent adult emergence and fertility.
Impact and movement of NOW in large field blocks will be examined using traps grids for males and females following aerial release using standard NOW SIT program methods.
Improvement of estimates of overwintering abundance will be addressed by comparing sanitation assessments (the number of unharvested nuts per tree during winter) between automated and previously-used hand methods for sanitation surveys.
