Across the corn belt depending on time of year | Rootworm has a incredible ability to become resistant to any single management strategy used to control it. Use annual rotation of corn and soybeans and rootworm starts laying in soybeans instead of corn (rotation resistant strain). Use only a rootworm trait and rootworm resistance to those traits follows in 5 years. All of the Bt traits are compromised with wide spread rootworm resistance. Introduce RNAi (SmartStak Pro or Vorceed) and damage is observed in the field in year 1 in Iowa and eastern Colorado. So if biocontrol nematodes were used alone, why wouldn’t the same results happen?
For that scientific reason, we have decided to market biocontrol nematodes to be used with a RW trait. Traits which are failing continue to kill a lot of rootworms and the nematodes are targeting the trait resistant survivors. A win-win for the farmer and the seed companies. The application of biocontrol nematodes to a field allows farmers to utilize the cheaper older RW traits and save input costs.
Biocontrol nematodes are a mortality factor truly independent from trait toxins. |
Biological Control of Rootworm - A link to a recent presentation
