Project Overview
Annual Reports
Commodities
- Vegetables: tomatoes
Practices
- Crop Production: organic fertilizers
- Education and Training: demonstration, extension, on-farm/ranch research, workshop
- Farm Business Management: budgets/cost and returns
- Pest Management: biorational pesticides, botanical pesticides, disease vectors, economic threshold, integrated pest management, physical control, mulching - plastic, prevention
Proposal abstract:
The purpose of this project is to develop novel sustainable programs to manage thrips and thrips-transmitted Tomato spotted wilt virus (TSWV), one of the most devastating pest complexes affecting tomato and other vegetable crops in the southern USA. Although growers have routinely used synthetic pesticides in attempts to manage thrips and tomato spotted wilt, use of such pesticides alone do not provide effective control. Therefore, there is a clear need for more sustainable and effective methods to control thrips and thrips-transmitted TSWV. We propose to use environmentally safe plant essential oils as thrips repellents and to augment the repellent/deterrent effects of plant essential oils with kaolin based particle films, a naturally occurring mineral. The integration of these naturally derived materials could reduce the use of synthetic pesticides in tomato production. In this project, we will conduct field trials to determine the effect of plant essential oils and kaolin, and we will complement these field trials with laboratory experiments to test how these materials actually are affecting thrips. By combining field and laboratory trials, we will be able to refine and optimize methods for deploying plant essential oils and kaolin in thrips and tomato spotted wilt management in tomatoes. We will assess the practicality of these new tactics by conducting cost benefit analyses of each field trial, the management strategies that yields the greatest financial return to the grower. We will demonstrate findings to growers, commodity groups, IPM providers, and the agrochemical industry through field days and on-farm trials conducted by our farmer cooperator. The extension cooperators will facilitate ongoing delivery of information through appropriate extension service outlets. This information will help to generate greater interest in developing plant essential oils as commercial products and provide baseline data on the efficacy of plant essential oils and kaolin to control thrips and tomato spotted wilt. We anticipate that these plant essential oils and kaolin will prove useful in managing thrips and tomato spotted wilt in an environmentally sound and sustainable manner and thus help to reduce the use of synthetic pesticides. Therefore, the results of this project will lead to enhanced worker safety and environmental and food quality, without sacrificing yields and profits for farmers.
Project objectives from proposal:
- Compare efficacy of the plant essential oils geraniol, lemongrass oil and tea tree oil, and kaolin to standard insecticides in controlling thrips and tomato spotted wilt in tomatoes. Optimize use of kaolin and essential oils by determining how they affect thrips and their ability to transmit Tomato spotted wilt virus. Refine use of plant essential oils and kaolin in the field based on mechanisms determined in laboratory studies of Objective 2. To determine, through Cost Benefit Analysis of each field trial, the management strategies that yields the greatest financial return to the grower. Demonstrate and disseminate findings to growers, commodity groups, IPM providers, and the agrochemical industry as a means to generate greater interest in developing plant essential oils as commercial products and provide baseline data on the efficacy of plant essential oils and kaolin to control thrips and tomato spotted wilt.