Progress 10/01/10 to 09/30/11
Outputs
Progress Report Objectives (from AD-416) 1. To determine the laboratory host range of agents selected for assessment, the first being Idiophantis sp. 2. To assess the data and discern the safety of releasing agents in Florida for biological control. 3. To prepare and release permitted insects for distribution and field evaluation in Florida. Approach (from AD-416) The methods for determining the laboratory host range of agents will follow the guidelines for experimental methodology and analysis in the Reviewer�s Manual for the Technical Advisory Group [TAG] for Biological Control Agents of Weeds (http://www.aphis.usda. gov/import_export/plants/manuals/ports/downloads/tag.pdf). Specifically no-choice (starvation) tests to determine whether agents will complete development on nontarget species will be conducted. Should development occur, further tests of whether species will sustain agents for multiple generations will be made. If the laboratory host range of an agent is specific, then a petition for its release will be prepared and submitted to USDA APHIS PPQ for review by TAG. Approved agents will be transferred to scientists in Ft. Lauderdale for field release and evaluation. This subordinate project is related to in-house objective 4: Conduct risk analysis to determine environmental safety of new and existing potential biological control agents for weeds by surveying for natural enemies of Rhodomyrtus tomentosa, developing rearing methods for select herbivores and testing the host specificity of candidate agents in quarantine. The mission of the lab is to develop environmentally safe, sustainable suppression of exotic invasive species that threaten natural, agricultural, and urban ecosystems in the United States with an emphasis on weeds. Two shipments of Metharmostis new sp. were received in quarantine in Jan and Jun 2011. A mass rearing protocol was developed for this species which in the F3 generation may produce more individuals than can be utilized. In addition, a single individual of each of two other prospective species was reared from larva to adult for identification and later consideration as biocontrol agents. In May 2011, development of test protocols was initiated for Metharmostis with efforts directed towards determining numbers of controls needed/test for repeatable results. Test protocols in progress are to answer: 1) how many eggs on cut pieces of R. tomentosa, one egg/cut piece, will continue to develop and hatch if each cut piece is wedged in a tip of a new shoot, and once eggs hatch, how many larvae will move to new shoots to feed and mature to the pupal stage; a test of 29 eggs is in progress; 2) how many older larvae feeding inside stems of shoots will self-transfer and develop to pupae when cut pieces of stems with larvae are tethered to stems of fresh shoots; a test of 24 older larvae is in progress. A test protocol just initiated is designed to answer how many neonate larvae manually transferred to tips of new shoots, one larva/tip, will develop to the pupal stage; four neonates have been transferred so far. About 175 R. tomentosa plants have been maintained throughout fiscal year 2011 year for rearing Metharmostis and small numbers of other species. This involves routine watering, weeding, repotting, fertilizing, transplanting, pruning, applying biopesticides and fungicides, covering plants with frost blankets during periods of frost and freezing temperatures, and removing frost blankets during other times. Our current plant stock produces more than ample material for our needs but when host range are underway more plants will be needed. Three methods to propagate R. tomentosa from seeds were tried but few seedlings were produced. Propagation by cuttings worked once but could not be repeated. A fourth trial of seed propagation was initiated in June 2011 (no seedlings as of late July) and another trial of cuttings in July 2011 (too soon for results).
Impacts
(N/A)
Publications
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