HD34 - The Use of Beneficial Insects in Virginia

  • Published: 1989
  • Author: Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services
  • Enabling Authority: House Joint Resolution 98 (Regular Session, 1988)

Executive Summary:
The expansion of government's role in biological control activities is both appropriate and warranted as a means to reduce pesticide use in urban and rural communities, reduce production cost, improve the competitiveness of Virginia farmers in national and international markets, and reduce environmental contamination of Virginia's land, streams, groundwater, and the Chesapeake Bay.

Despite the fact that over five million pounds of pesticides (active ingredients) are applied in Virginia each year, Virginia producers still suffer losses of approximately 300 million dollars yearly due to plant pests. Rather than employ a single control tactic (chemical), the coordinated use of multiple control tactics, known as Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is used by the growers to keep pest populations below damaging levels.

Among the pest control strategies utilized in an IPM system, biological control has the greatest potential for further development; however, the current facilities which house the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services' (VDACS) biological control programs were not designed for that use and are inadequate for a major biological control effort. New facilities and program staff are essential if present programs are to be upgraded and expanded, and new programs implemented. Currently, VDACS is involved in biological control of the musk and curled thistle, Mexican bean beetle, cereal leaf beetle, Japanese beetle, and gypsy moth. A state biological control facility would give the Commonwealth the opportunity and ability to establish additional biological control programs for corn earworm, multiflora rose, European corn borer, white peach and euonymus scale, Colorado potato beetle, oriental fruit moth, spider mites, tobacco budworm, house and stable flies, and spotted knapweed. Its central location and proximity to major crop growing and urban areas caused the steering committee to favor the Richmond area as the proposed laboratory site.

Commercial laboratories, universities, and state and federal laboratories all have a role to play in biological control programs. The universities provide basic research and distribute information through the Extension Division. The state or federal laboratories develop mass rearing techniques, field test and implement the biological control programs, demonstrate the economic feasibility and environmental compatibility of biological control strategies, and provide insects for research. Commercial laboratories can produce and distribute biological agents when economically feasible or profitable to growers or special interest groups after the control agents have been proven effective.

The United States Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS) is the lead federal agency which locates, imports, and screens potential biological control agents. ARS currently maintains overseas laboratories for the collection of natural enemies and forwards them to quarantine facilities in the United States. The DSDA Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, Plant, Protection and Quarantine (APHIS-PPQ) maintains biological control laboratories in Niles, MI; Bozeman MT; and Mission, TX. These laboratories are used to rear biological control agents for use in cooperative federal and state suppression programs of weed and insect pests.

The states of Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, South Dakota, and Wisconsin currently conduct biological control programs. Arizona, California, Colorado, Florida, Hawaii, Maryland, New Jersey, and North Carolina have biological control facilities. North Carolina and Colorado, like Virginia, seek to expand their biological control facilities.