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Research update

Stepping up the battle against the brown marmorated stink bug (BMSB)

11 Dec 2019

The brown marmorated stink bug, Halyomorpha halys, known as BMSB, poses an enormous threat to New Zealand’s biosecurity. The bug has run rampant in Italy and in some regions is causing 100 percent crop losses. 

Plant & Food Research principal scientist Professor Max Suckling and colleagues recently conducted trapping trials using a novel live trap to catch adult bugs. The new traps are designed to utilise the wind direction via a wind vane and trap bugs inside a pheromone-baited cylinder. The upwind end is covered with mesh which stops the bugs escaping while the downwind end contains an “entry-only” mesh cone. 

The new traps caught up to 15-times more adult BMSB than the sticky panel traps. The maximum caught in a 24 hour period was 96 live adults, while the average catch was around seven times higher than the sticky panels. 

Commercially-produced traps using this prototype could be used to help employ the sterile insect technique, support colony rearing or to kill bugs. 

Support for this study was provided by the Fondazione Edmund Mach and enabled by a Trimble Award to DMS from the New Zealand Institute for Agricultural and Horticultural Science. The work was also supported by Better Border Biosecurity (www.b3nz.org). 

Like all B3 research, any application of these tools will need to be evaluated with reference to current practices and ease of implementation.

Watch the video about the trap in the paper

Journal Reference:

Suckling DM, Levy MC, Roselli G, Mazzoni V,  Ioriatti C , Deromedi M,  Cristofaro M,  Anfora G  2019 Live Traps for Adult Brown Marmorated Stink Bugs. Insects 10 (11), 376  https://doi.org/10.3390/insects10110376

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