Coster, Jack E.

Merrifield, Robert G.

Woessner, R.A.

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Stephen F. Austin State UniversitySFA ScholarWorksFaculty Publications Forestry4-1972Evaluation of Four Systemic Insecticides Againstthe Cottonwood Twig BorerJack E. CosterRobert G. MerrifieldR.A. WoessnerFollow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/forestryPart of the Forest Sciences CommonsTell us how this article helped you.This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the Forestry at SFA ScholarWorks. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publicationsby an authorized administrator of SFA ScholarWorks. For more information, please contact cdsscholarworks@sfasu.edu.Recommended CitationCoster, Jack E.; Merrifield, Robert G.; and Woessner, R.A., "Evaluation of Four Systemic Insecticides Against the Cottonwood TwigBorer" (1972). Faculty Publications. Paper 316.http://scholarworks.sfasu.edu/forestry/316612 JOLR:"AL OF E O"O:-'IIC EI\TO:-'IOLOGY rol. 65.110. 2FIG. 1.- creen-enclo ed o\ipo ition cage.cia surfa e within cre n \I'ere piled se\ eral masse deepand could 1I0t be counted accuratel ' becau e of the debriadhel-ing to their urfaces. Also egg adhered to the claysurface of the pot when sticks were removed. The e in-acce sible ggs were paniall respon ible for the 46,300differ nce for the 2 typ s of comainer when both wereheld in the insectary. vailability of eggs was thereforean imponant factor in ·valuating efficienc oC technique.]n the insectary, general activity oC adult in both typecage wa high during daylight hour. Howe er, move-ment was not oriented. and beetles were observed feedinginfrequently. Beetle held in the rearing room in thedark were Ie s acti\e, but generall were found feedingor ovipo iting when ver ob ened. Their feeding habitand degr e of activity had a marked effect on urvivalas indicat d by mortaliti S of 63.3, 44.2, and 13.3% in thecreened cage, metal cylinders held in the in ectary, andmetal C) linder held in the rearing room, respectively.Thlls conditions maintained in the rearing room were]OIG. 2.-Metal oviposition cage with aluminum-foil floor.apparentl' mOre conduci\'e to extend d un'ival of adult.Maintenance of Cl'linder was minimum. The alu-minum-foil floors wel:e vacuum cleaned weekI' to remO\'efecal material and plam debri .A a re ult of the te t, whitcfringed b tIe maintainedby our laboratol . for egg production are now held inmetal cylinder at 0° ± 2°F and 90 ± 3% RH in darkne .Factor respon ible for the cllange to the new conditionwere (I) reduced mailllellance time, (2) h)gher egg pro-duction, (3) more available eggs, (4) egg free of debd ,and (5) extended 1I1Ti\'al of adults....--,-Evaluation of Four Systemic Insecticides Against the Cottonwood Twig Borerl.~JACK E. 0 TrR; ROBERT G. MrRRIFlrLD,' and R. A. \\-OF NrR'Ea tern oltonwood, Popttltt delloides Banram, i oneof the fa te t gl'owin tre in l'\onh Amel'ica whenplanted on the most f'l\orable site. It wood has a widerange of u e from furniture pans and cores to shippingcontainer and panelillg. lLs pulping haraeteristics areexcellent. Becaus of it value and rapid growth, colton-wood is an excellent tre to grow in plantations.The tree i attacked by nllmeroll ill ect includingleaf miner, awflie, caterpillars, and borer. Througholltthe outh, however, the most eriou pest is the COllon-wood twig borer, Gyp olloma haimlJochiollo (Kearfoll)(Mon'is 195 , 1967), The lanae of thi olethrelllid mothtunnel in ide terminals and lateral bnlllche . Thi activityre ults in k.illing or injuring the temlinal bud and twigwith lib quent 10 in height and in obje tionableforking.MOlTis (1960) reported u e oE a du t containing 4~'"phorate and activated carbon a a dip at planting time.Granular phorate has al 0 be n evaluated against the1 Lepidoptera: Olethreutidae."Approved [or publi ation as TA-9l97 by the Director, TexasAgricultural Experiment tation. Recched for public3110n i\Iay28, 1971.3 chool of Fore try, lcphcn F..\u tin lale t.:'nhcrsity, Nacog-doche . Tex, 75961.• Department o[ Forest cien e, Texas A&;\[ University. College,a,ion 77813.• Texas Forest en ice. College la,ion 77 43.cOllon\l'ood twig borer in a ;\]is i sippi tud)' (;\lorris1965). Treated trees howed sign.ificant increa e inheight and diameter after' year.In 196 , aldicarb, carboEuran, and di u)[oton granulewere used in various combinations of mot dips and sidedre sing in a n wly established cottonwood plantationin Texas (R. G. Merrifield and '. H. And rson, un,publi 'hed data). ]n these test, all the cllemical pro-vided a reduction in twig borer allacks, but the re ultwere highl . variable.The pre ent tudie ,,'ere undertaken in 1970 to de-tel-mine further the effectivene of.j y temic imecLicidesagain. t the cottonwood t"'ig borer in Te. as.METHOD ,-The te t plot were ituated on the Texa,\,,;\1 L'ni\·er. it)' faml. Burle on County. The soil' on thetcst area are ;\'on\'ood ilt loams and Miller cia' . Theseare allu\'ial depo it along the Brazo Ri\er and are con,sidered highly productive oil. for agriCllllllre, EasterncOllOnWO(){! is found in natural stand along the ri\crand appear well uited for the e soils.The trees used in the sllIdy grew from 20-in. colton-1I'00d CUlling that had been planted at a spacing of5X14 ft in pril 1970. The in cticide te·t· were repli-cated 3 tim ; each replicate contained 160 tree and \\'aarranged in a split-plO[ design .The insecticides chosen For \'aluation were 10c;, Cofonnulation of aldicarb, carbofuran, di.,tdfoton. and• jApriLJ972 CIE:"TIFIC 'OTE 613Table I.-Mean number of G. Ha;l1Ibach;alla auacksper tree in eastern cOllonwood plots treated with sy temicinsecticides. Insecticides applied fa I4 and ug. J4,1970.II ~Icans within a column followed by a common lellcr arc notignificanlly dHferenl from the controls at the 59'0 lcycl accordingto DunnelL's procedure.b ~umber of auacks counted for entire trees.e Xumber o£ auacks coullLed for uppcrmosL Ij-in. terminal.jlllle, 1970"0 (control) 0.20 a 0.29 a 0.27 a 0,20 aY2 .21 a ,21 a .1 a .12 a1 .14 a .21 a .07 .102 .12 a .20 a .07 .07Insecticidemean .16 .21 .11 .10SOl/ember, 1970'0 (col1lrol) .57 a .51 a .61 a .... \ aV2 .29 .39 a .22 .3LL .15 .40a .Il .262 .L .49 a .18 .2~Insecticidemeans .21 .43 .17 .26Abrahamson of the outhern Fore t Experiment tation,lOneville, Miss., for reading the manu cript and off ringhelpful L1ggeslions.REFEREi\'CE CITEDfon'is, R. C. 1958. Insect pests of cOLlonwood rep'o,duclion. !VIi s. Agr. Exp. Sta. Inform. heel 591. 2 p.1960. Control of coLlonlVood inseci with a )' t micin ticide. J. Fore l. 59: 7J .1965. Controlling insect damage to olllhern hardwoodforests. Proc. 14th For. ymp., La. tate Univ., p.114-24.1967. Biology of GY/Jsol1olna ha;mboc!l;ol1a (Lepidop-tera: Olethreutidae), a twig bor I' in eastern cotton·wood. Ann. £nLOl11ol. oc. Amer. 60: 423-7.IdicarbCarbo-furanDisul-[oLOnIn ecticide'Insecticide pertree, oz Phoratephorate. Each chemical "a te ted at 0, Y2, I, and 2 ozof G formulation/ tree. The granule- were placed in 4hole made equidi tallll· around the trees with a tree-planting bar. The specified do age wa placed in thehole LO a depth of 6-8 in. and cover I with oil. In-cticide application were made May 14 and againAug. 14.The plot were cultivated 3 time during the ea-onbut received no irrigation or [eniJization. Rainfall fromApril to September totaled about 16 in. However, 14.5 in.occurred during April, May, and eptember. June, July,and August were extrem Iy dry.Twig-borer damag wa determined by counting thealtack on tenninals or lateral branche. The I t countwa made June 25, 1970, and con i t d of a tally of alltwig borer attack on the trees. ince their average heightat the time wa onl' about 1.5 ft. The 2nd count wasmade Nov. 20. At this Lime, the a\erage tree height waabout 4.5 ft, 0 count were made of attacks only on theLOp 15 in. of the uppermost terminal of each tree. Heightsof all Lrees "'ere mea ured June 2" and again Nov. 20.RrsuLTs AND DI s 10'l.-By June 25, 6 week after the1st application of the chemicals, the only signficant re-duction in number of twig-borer altacks was for aldicarband carbofurall at 1 and 2 oz/tree (Table I). At thistime, also, it wa' observed that about 15% of the treein the 1- and 2-07 aldicarb plot exhibit d marginal leafburning. ign or ph) IOLOXicit)' ,,'ere not found in anyother plot.The 1 ovembel- count of twig borer attacks wa made14 ,,'eek after the 2nd application of chemical. Grol\'thof the trees was completed and twig borer Iiight activit)'I\'a nearly over. All the chemicals significantly reducedthe number of attack with the exception of disulfoton(Table 1). Average control for all rate of each in ecti-cide wa 15% for di ulfoton, 55% for alclicarb, 63% forphorate, and 66% for carbofuran. The be t control (820/.)was achieved with carbofuran at I oz/tree followed byphorate (73%) at 1 oz/tree.In spite of the fact that the attack were reduced innumber, height growth of the treated tree wa not in-creased significantly, Thi phenomenon was thought tobe due to lack f rainfall in the mid-growing eason. Thetree attained onl about % of the height normall ex-pected. In all ca e , however, the height of the treatedtrees was greater than that of untreated trees, eventhough the clifference were not ignificant.•\CKNOWLEDG)IENT. - We thank R. C. JOITi and L.Roller Cages for Study of Wood-Products Insects In Building Crawl Spaces1Lo 'NtE H. WILLIAMS'outhern Fore t Experiment Station, DA Fore t ervice, Gulfport, Mis i ippi 3950LBeetles that deslroy easoned wood f.requently initiatetheir infestation in the crawl paces under raised build-ing. Here untreated wood i a\'ailable, and the em iron-ment is often favorable; the temperature i cooler andmore table than in mo t exposed part of buildings, andthe reJati\'e humidity i higher. The equilibrium moi -ture content of wood in crawl pace typically is higherthan in the rest of the building, and it constantly varieswith chang in the rate of vaporization and conden a-tion of moisture from the soil below. Thi environmenti difficult and expensive to reproduce in a laboraLOr ,and for many re eard1 purposes a crawl pace ervesa well as a control I d- Iwironment chamber designed tosimulate it.1 Received for publication June ,1971., _\ssociate Elllomologisl.Til paces under buildings were not designed forcientific experimentation, howe\·er. ince height normal-ly varie El-om I to 3 ft, entr and manell\erability arcdifficult. Enclo LIre \'aries from negligible in open-piercon truClion to completely enclosed, dark, and ul1\enti-lated in om building.At the Wood Products Insect Laboralor in Gulfport,!VIi ., we have designed and built cages that roll ontrack attached to Ihe unclersurfaces of ubfiooring orIioor joi ts (Fig. I). The cages are easily inserted or re-moved fOl' examination of wood te t blocks. We thinkthe y tern i c-'(cellellt for study of nobiidae and olherstructural pests in the habitat where the)' are u uallydestructi \·e.OUl" cag are 3 in. wide, 5 in. high, and I Y2 in. long.The dimension permit inclu ion of one 2x4XI7-in. Ie tblock for life-hi tOl'y studie. Test piece of this ize are

Evaluation of Four Systemic Insecticides Against the Cottonwood Twig Borer

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Evaluation of Four Systemic Insecticides Against the Cottonwood Twig Borer

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