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Combining banker plants to achieve long-term pest control in multi-pest and multi-natural enemy cropping systems

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Abstract

Banker plants increase biological pest control by supporting populations of non-pest arthropod species, used as alternative hosts or prey by natural enemies. Due to the specificity of trophic interactions, banker plants may not efficiently promote natural enemies with different ecologies. Yet in most cropping systems, different pest species are present together and require different biocontrol agents to efficiently control them. In the present study, we tested the combined use of two banker plants and their associated prey/host to enhance populations of the specialist parasitoid Encarsia formosa targeting the main tomato pest Bemisia tabaci, and a polyphagous ladybird Propylea japonica targeting the secondary pest Myzus persicae in tomato crops. In a laboratory and a greenhouse experiment, we measured the abundances of these four species using the Ricinus communis—Trialeurodes ricini banker plant system alone, in combination with the Glycines max—Megoura japonica system, or in absence of banker plants. We found that the first banker plant system enhanced populations of E. formosa, resulting in increased suppression of B. tabaci populations and the suppression of their outbreak in both our laboratory and greenhouse experiment. Conversely, abundances of P. japonica were not affected by this first system, but were significantly increased when the second was present. This resulted in increased control of M. persicae populations and the suppression of their early and late outbreaks. Our study demonstrates the potential for combined banker plants to provide long-term, sustainable control of multiple pests by their target natural enemies in complex agroecosystems.

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Acknowledgements

The study was funded by the project 32072479 supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China, the National Key Research and Development Programme of China (2017YFD0201000; 2018YFD0200402), the Beijing Key Laboratory of Environment Friendly Management of Fruit Diseases and Pests in North China (BZ0432), the Beijing Science and Technology Project (z201100008020014), the Key Research and Development Programme of the Jiangxi Province (202002BBF62006), and the Key Research and Development Programme of Shandong (Public Welfare; 2019GSF109118).

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  1. Xu Chen and Coline C. Jaworski equally contributed to this study.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Green Pesticide & Agricultural Engineering Ministry of Education P.R. China, Guizhou University, Guiyang, Guizhou Province, China

    Xu Chen & Lian-Sheng Zang

  2. Institute of Plant and Environment Protection, Beijing Academy of Agricultural and Forestry Sciences, Beijing, China

    Xu Chen, Coline C. Jaworski, Xiaojun Guo & Su Wang

  3. Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK

    Coline C. Jaworski

  4. Department of Zoology, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, CB2 3EJ, UK

    Coline C. Jaworski

  5. Weifang University of Science and Technology, Weifang, Shandong, China

    Huijie Dai

  6. Institute of Plant Protection, Jiangxi Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Nanchang, Jiangxi, China

    Yuyong Liang

  7. Université Côte D’Azur, INRAE, CNRS, UMR ISA, 06000, Nice, France

    Nicolas Desneux

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Chen, X., Jaworski, C.C., Dai, H. et al. Combining banker plants to achieve long-term pest control in multi-pest and multi-natural enemy cropping systems. J Pest Sci 95, 685–697 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10340-021-01428-6

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