Plant Health and the Science of Pests and Diseases

The health/disease duality has developed alongside human history either as a struggle for survival or as a challenge of the human being to effectively get to know himself. To speak about pests and diseases of plants may not be as exciting as when speaking of human beings; however, entomology and phytopathology hold methodological similarities to conventional medicine, which, thus, allow for correlations among them. After all, plant protection and human medical science are based under common epistemological principles of modern scientific thought. Hence, the goal of this essay is to disclose certain disagreements of the disciplines of phytopathology and entomology with agroecological based science; yet, giving way to a discussion according to ecological principles. This is a theoretical essay, based on bibliographical research and on the direct experience of the authors with family farmers in the South of Brazil during the last 20 years

Avaliação de biofertilizantes, extratos vegetais e diferentes substâncias alternativas no manejo de tripes em cebola em sistema orgânico.

Avaliou-se substâncias alternativas no manejo de tripes (Thrips tabaci Lind.), em cebola, cv, Crioula, no sistema orgânico. Os experimentos foram conduzidos na EPAGRI, Ituporanga (SC). Os períodos entre transplante e colheita foram de 11/09/1996 a 10/01/1997 e 13/08/1997 a 11/12/1997. O delineamento foi de blocos ao acaso com 8 tratamentos em 1996 e 12 tratamentos em 1997 e quatro repetições. Em 1996 os tratamentos incluíram o biofertilizante anaeróbico 50%, biofertilizante aeróbico 5%, sulfato de manganês 1%, extrato hidroalcoólico de própolis 0,2%, macerado de ervas (“fersoral”) 2% e 4%, extrato de fumo (Nicotiana tabacum) 2 L ha-1 + 1% detergente neutro, testemunha sem aplicação. Em 1997 os tratamentos incluíram o macerado de ervas (“fersoral”) 5% 10%, enxofre pó molhável 0,25% + extrato hidroalcoólico de própolis 0,2% + extrato de samambaia 3%, biofertilizante anaeróbico 50%, biofertilizante aeróbico 5%, extrato de losna (Artemisia verlotorum) 3%, extrato de timbó (Ateleia glazioviana) 0,5%, extrato de samambaia (Pteridium aquilinum) 10%, extrato de erva-de-santa-maria (Chenopodium ambrosioides) 10%, extrato de cinamomo (Melia azedarach) 10%,extrato de camomila (Matricaria chamomilla) 5%, testemunha sem aplicação. Para aplicação dos produtos empregou-se pulverizador de pressão constante a base de CO2. Os tratamentos não causaram redução significativa na incidência de tripes e aumentos significativos na produtividade

Pervasive gaps in Amazonian ecological research

Biodiversity loss is one of the main challenges of our time,1,2 and attempts to address it require a clear un derstanding of how ecological communities respond to environmental change across time and space.3,4 While the increasing availability of global databases on ecological communities has advanced our knowledge of biodiversity sensitivity to environmental changes,5–7 vast areas of the tropics remain understudied.8–11 In the American tropics, Amazonia stands out as the world’s most diverse rainforest and the primary source of Neotropical biodiversity,12 but it remains among the least known forests in America and is often underrepre sented in biodiversity databases.13–15 To worsen this situation, human-induced modifications16,17 may elim inate pieces of the Amazon’s biodiversity puzzle before we can use them to understand how ecological com munities are responding. To increase generalization and applicability of biodiversity knowledge,18,19 it is thus crucial to reduce biases in ecological research, particularly in regions projected to face the most pronounced environmental changes. We integrate ecological community metadata of 7,694 sampling sites for multiple or ganism groups in a machine learning model framework to map the research probability across the Brazilian Amazonia, while identifying the region’s vulnerability to environmental change. 15%–18% of the most ne glected areas in ecological research are expected to experience severe climate or land use changes by 2050. This means that unless we take immediate action, we will not be able to establish their current status, much less monitor how it is changing and what is being lostinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio