|
| seems that keeping old barns around that provide habitat for bats may be good for our corn fields.
Joel
WIU Agriculture
**************************************************
http://www.batcon.org/resources/media-education/news-room/gen-news/...
To investigate the value of bats as agricultural pest control, SIU Carbondale grad student Josiah Maine used custom built “exclosures” – netted structures aimed at keeping bats outside of them and away from the corn.
“The main pest in my system was the corn earworm, a moth whose larvae cause billions of dollars’ worth of damage to corn, cotton, tomatoes, and many other crops,” Maine said. “The larvae feed on corn ears, causing direct damage to yield, but they also can introduce an avenue for infection of the corn ear by fungi, which produce compounds that are toxic to humans and livestock.”
Keeping the bats out meant pests, such as the corn earworm, were largely free to reign havoc on the corn crops. But bats are not the only predators of these agricultural pests. To ensure only bats were excluded by the exclosures Maine moved the structures twice daily so birds could forage normally.
After analyzing the results, Maine said he found nearly 60 percent more earworm larvae inside the exclosures – protected from the hungry bats – than in the unprotected control areas. He also found more than 50 percent more corn kernel damage per ear in the corn inside the exclosures.
*snip*
| |
|
Bats worth over 1 billion to corn farmers
