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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 13, 1980)
Local THE BATTALION Page 7 THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 13, 1980 Bugs conquer bugs, control pests Techniques not refined enough to replace pesticides yet Kilo by PilOVJ tuberculin ent vacciB IcMurraj diet mav’ti n farms aads Jngg ; on 60,000 b irth vallevil arable olisti ;t crop ofli e land, slii; the frozenji is and kntil spring sun» fields, easy, t d they can!) irctic valley, | ve still goto; ] wild I a barley faral iped down il ,000 wdrtWj ennis Greei j partment ojl ts the state'if i herd, soail is out oftlif) ied with poffil oic fence to I field,’ Clt!| ontract 1 ojech sa the bul ;tics on theft s and their'| barring them aow rounds t| stampedes! gers” thi ve also been) iveah backagain,® :SDAY SPECIAL ried Ste^ n Gravy Dtatoesa^ one other tabie ead andB^ 1 orTea SPECl EUENI* 1 <;gYDl^ dwith -y Sauce 1 Dress' 11 ; read' orTea Gravy , 0 iceo |afl getabls By LAURA CORTEZ Battalion Reporter Despite potential nealth and en vironmental hazards, there appears to be no end in sight to the large- scale use of pesticides in this coun try. Biological control, however, is a non-chemical method of control that has been successful in reducing pes ticide use. Predators, parasites and disease organisms can be used to effectively control insects, diseases and weeds which destroy about 33 percent of the potential food crop in the United States. Basically, biological control aims at restoring and maintaining the natural balance of the ecosystem. Much of the pest problem results Pesticides are used heavily in this area, and “you’re not going to convince many growers that pesticides are not good — they’ve had too much success with them,” Dr. Frank Gilstrap, associ ate professor of entomolo gy at Texas A&M Universi ty, said. from man transporting plant and animal species from their natural habitats to places foreign to them. In addition, excessive pesticide use destroys beneficial as well as pest insects. Dr. David Pimentel, an entomo logist at Cornell University, esti mates that crop losses due to insect pests have increased nearly twofold (7 percent to about 13 percent) from the 1940s to the early 1970s. Pesticides are primarily used to help combat the problem, but the “bug vs. bug” method of pest control has been successful on many food crops. Dr. Frank Gilstrap, associate pro fessor of entomology at Texas A&M University, said although California, Hawaii and Florida are the leaders in biological control of insects, Texas has had some “striking successes,” and has the potential to be the leader. Biological control is a “routine technique” in controlling pests on citrus crops in the Rio Grande Val ley, where the citrus black fly is being maintained at a low level by its parasite (a beneficial insect that lays eggs in the pest insect, thus killing the pest while producing its own offspring). Gilstrap said this method is also being used on tree crops, such as peaches, apples and olives, as well as on nut crops. It has not been widely Voyager 1 meets no obstacles _ , _ United Press International PASADENA, Calif. — Climaxing a three-year space journey, Voyager 11 cruised inside the mysterious rings | of Saturn Wednesday, pouring back | fascinating photographs to Earth as it \ nea red its closest encounter to the [second largest planet in the solar i system. The rain in Spain proved no obsta- [ de to reception of the signals. | Pulled by Saturn’s gravity to a high [ s P ee d of 56,559 mph, the spacecraft | w as scheduled to reach its closest {approach point at 5:46 p.m. CST, ^skimming just 77,200 miles above me rolling clouds of the giant gas ball. Scientists at the Jet Propulsion r Laboratory were concerned that | rainstorms in Spain during the night j would interfere with reception of ! some of the most important data by ; an ai )tenna near Madrid, but their | Worries proved unwarranted. We re heading for our close en- ; counter and all is going well. A num- } er of fascinating photographs have \ c °me in, Hibbs said. THE difficult we do im I1t11 DIATELY ' THE impossible TAKES a LITTLE LONGER" f AGENT 1 AERO air freight f SERVICES WE DO MORE THAN ^ DELIVER YOUR PACKAGE OVERNIGHT WE GUARANTEE IT! 150 CITIES $22.11 UP TO 2 LBS. accepted on field crops, such as vegetables, however, due to lack of necessary research. But Gilstrap added that much research in Texas is addressing the area. And although much of the re- • search is being done in this county (at Texas A&M), little is being im plemented here. “Brazos County is certainly not the vanguard of biological control,” Gilstrap said. Pesticides are used heavily in this area, and “you’re not going to con vince many growers that pesticides are not good—they’ve had too much success with them,” he said. Another problem is that biological control does not eliminate all of a particular pest and may leave insect parts in certain crops. Gilstrap said, “Although there are tolerances (legal levels) for pesticide residues, the tolerance for insect parts is zero. This means you better use pesticides or you can’t sell your crops. We’re caught in a vicious circle.” The problem now is that there is not enough information on how much crop loss farmers would suffer if they stopped using pesticides. In an article in BioScience, Pimentel said, “At this time, it is not clear whether crop losses due to in sect pests would continue to increase or would decrease over time if pesti cide use were terminated. Gilstrap said that sound research must be the basis for pesticide use, and researchers, rather than chemic al salesmen, should be consulted be fore pesticides are employed. But while it is doubtful whether pesticides will be replaced by biolo gical control, there will be a trend away from pesticide use in some crops, and more emphasis on pest management, which takes advantage of as many natural sources of control as possible, he said. Weeds and plant diseases also cause serious problems in food “Biological control will not be the solution to all our problems. But what’s frus trating is that it could be the solution to many more of our problems, ” Gilstrap said. crops, but biological control in these areas is not as advanced as insect control. Dr. R. D. Martyn of the plant sci ences department at Texas A&M said, “Entomology is without a doubt in the driver’s seat when it comes to biological control. They (entomolog ists) have about a hundred year jump on us, and they’ve got much more success stories than we have.” He said most of the work in plant pathogens is still in the experimental stage, and little is applied. Martyn cited two successful prog rams in the United States: one at the University of Arkansas where a fun gus is being used to control Northern joint vetch weed in rice crops, and another in the Pacific Northwest, where a fungus is being used to con trol skeleton weed on rangeland crops. Biological control is not practiced in this county, but Texas A&M is involved in a good deal of research. Among this research is control of aquatic weeds that plague Texas riv ers and lakes. One of these weeds, the water hyacinth, is being grown for research purposes in plastic chil dren’s swimming pools in a green house on Agronomy Road. Martyn said that even though biological control is still in the ex perimental stages, other non chemical methods such as breeding for disease resistance and making the environment unfavorable to the pathogen are being successfully used. He could not estimate when biolo gical control would become wide spread. “The breakthrough could come tomorrow or it could never come,” he said. It appears progress in plant and weed control is coming slowly, yet the success of insect control is en couraging, and the benefits are clear — it is safer and cheaper than pesti cides. An example of the cost difference is a beneficial wasp which controls citrus red scale for $20 an acre, com pared to $200 an acre for pesticide spraying. “Biological control will not be the solution to all our problems. But what’s frustrating is that it could be the solution to many more of our problems,” he said. Follow the Aggies to Arkansas Chartered Bus Price: $ 40 which includes a ticket to the game. 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