Performance of the predator Amblyseius swirskii (Athias-Henriot) (Acari: Phytoseiidae) on plastic greenhouse pepper sprayed vs unsprayed pine pollen

Abstract

From sucking pests, a one of the most known important pest, flower thrips Frankliniella occidentalis (Pergande) (Thysanoptera: Thripidae) in protected vegetable cultivation in Turkey. The predatory mite, Amblyseius swirskii (Athias-Henriot) (Acari: Phytoseiidae) was used to control to suppress the pest population especially on pepper plant in more than 50 countries worldwide since 2005. According the literature on A. swirskii, it can survive on pepper plants sprayed with pine and cattail pollen, where there is no prey. Therefore, it was expected that population of a well-known pollenophagous species, A. swirskii can be increased by spraying pine pollen to peppers. Pollen was diluted in water and sprayed on the plants with backpack sprayer at the dose of 5 kg ha-1. In both experiments, the thrips populations was less than 2 per flower in the predatory mite released plots (with predators and without pollen and with predators and pine pollen) throughout the experiments. Contrary to our expectation, the provision of pine pollen to peppers did not result in increased number of the predatory mite. Our results clearly show that, the pine pollen was less suitable food source than the pepper own pollen for the predatory mite. Some study on pine pollen as a non-prey food source for A. swirskii with a full analysis of constituents is necessary.

Keywords

• Frankliniella occidentalis
• Predatory mite
• Biological control
• Protected crops