Soil temperature can effectively monitor and predict the spread of the corn earworm, a pest that ravages corn, cotton, soybeans, peppers, tomatoes, and other vegetable crops, a new study shows.

The ability to better monitor the pest and make predictions about where it will appear could help farmers control the pest more effectively, which would reduce the financial and environmental impacts of pesticide use.

For the study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the researchers combined historical soil temperature data with long-term corn earworm monitoring data and information on how the pest survives cold conditions in a lab setting to better understand “overwintering success,” or how well the pest can survive underground during the colder winter months.

Greater overwintering success can expand the areas where the pest can live and thrive, as the pest can migrate long distances, the researchers say.

“This is the canary in the coal mine for agricultural pests,” [co-author Anders] Huseth says. “Making sense of what’s taking place with this pest is really important for agricultural producers… Now we’d like to come up with a better forecasting tool for this pest, along with a risk-prediction model, in order to give growers better information about pest spread. Success here could reduce both costs for farmers and pesticide into the environment.”

This is an excerpt. Read the original post here