Effect of crop residue management on damage by Diatraea saccharalis (Lepidoptera: Crambidae), its egg parasitoids and the ants associated with sugarcane.

ISAS, MARCOS G.; PADILLA, AGUSTÍN E.; GOEBEL, FRANCOIS R.; SALVATORE, ANALÍA R.; PÉREZ, MARÍA L. DEL P.; AYUP, MA. MARTA; GASTAMINZA, GERARDO

BULLETIN OF ENTOMOLOGICAL RESEARCH

CAMBRIDGE UNIV PRESS

Lugar: Cambridge; Año: 2020 p. 1 - 9

0007-4853

In the American continent, the sugarcane borer Diatraea saccharalis (F.) is the main pest insugarcane producing areas. The objective of this study was to assess the effect of crop residuemanagement on damage by D. saccharalis, its egg parasitoids and the ants associated withsugarcane. The study was carried out during 2011?2012, 2012?2013 and 2013?2014 cropcycles, in three commercial fields located in different regions of Tucumán state, Argentina.Two types of crop residue management (= treatments) were compared: conservation oftrash at the soil surface (CT) and trash burning (TB). In ?trash conservation? treatment,crop residue was allowed to remain over the soil surface during the whole sugarcane growingseason, while the second treatment consisted of complete burning of trash blanket approximately 2 weeks after harvest. The injury level was measured by recording the number of stalksbored and internodes bored. Parasitism was estimated by counting the total number of eggsand number of black eggs (which indicates the occurrence of egg parasitoids). Ants(Formicidae) richness was calculated by two estimators; abundance-based coverage estimatorand incidence-based coverage estimator, using the non-parametric richness estimators: Chao2 and Jackknife. Finally, the indicator value was estimated through the measurement of specificity and fidelity. In all the parameters studied no significant difference was found betweenTB and CT treatments