Lure-and-kill technology to manage beetle pests (Sitona lineatus and Bruchus rufimanus) of field beans and peas

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This project aims to design and produce a control system for beetle pests of peas and beans, which does not use blanket sprays of insecticides. Instead, the beetles will be lured to simple devices, baited with beetle specific attractive odours, where they will be coated with spores of an insect fungal disease. When they leave the device they will spread the disease to other beetles like them. This will reduce pest beetle numbers and damage to the crops, but, unlike insecticide sprays, will not affect the environment or other beneficial and non-target insects such as pollinating bees. The insect fungal disease occurs naturally in the soil in the UK and does not pose a risk to other animals. The attractants used are either insect produced (a specific pheromone) or are odours produced by flowering peas and beans. The spores and the attractants will be prepared in a novel formulation that is electrostatically charged and sticks to the beetles body and is passed on to other beetles when they meet.