Risk assessment of maize damage by wireworms (Coleoptera: Elateridae) as the first step in implementing IPM and in reducing the environmental impact of soil insecticides

Environmental Science and Pollution Research, Oct 2016

A survey of maize fields was conducted in northeast Italy from 1986 to 2014, resulting in a dataset of 1296 records including information on wireworm damage to maize, plant-attacking species, agronomic characteristics, landscape and climate. Three wireworm species, Agriotes brevis Candeze, A. sordidus Illiger and A. ustulatus Schäller, were identified as the dominant pest species in maize fields. Over the 29-year period surveyed, no yield reduction was observed when wireworm plant damage was below 15 % of the stand. A preliminary univariate analysis of risk assessment was applied to identify the main factors influencing the occurrence of damage. A multifactorial model was then applied by using the significant factors identified. This model allowed the research to highlight the strongest factors and to analyse how the main factors together influenced damage risk. The strongest factors were: A. brevis as prevalent damaging species, soil organic matter content >5 %, rotation including meadows and/or double crops, A. sordidus as prevalent damaging species, and surrounding landscape mainly meadows, uncultivated grass and double crops. The multifactorial model also showed how the simultaneous occurrence of two or more of the aforementioned risk factors can conspicuously increase the risk of wireworm damage to maize crops, while the probability of damage to a field with no-risk factors is always low (<1 %). These results make it possible to draw risk maps to identify low-risk and high-risk areas, a first step in implementing bespoke IPM procedures in an attempt to reduce the impact of soil insecticides significantly.

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Risk assessment of maize damage by wireworms (Coleoptera: Elateridae) as the first step in implementing IPM and in reducing the environmental impact of soil insecticides

Risk assessment of maize damage by wireworms (Coleoptera: Elateridae) as the first step in implementing IPM and in reducing the environmental impact of soil insecticides L. Furlan 0 1 2 B. Contiero 0 1 2 F. Chiarini 0 1 2 M. Colauzzi 0 1 2 E. Sartori 0 1 2 I. Benvegnù 0 1 2 F. Fracasso 0 1 2 P. Giandon 0 1 2 0 Veneto Agricoltura , Viale dell'Università, 14, 35020 Legnaro, PD , Italy 1 ARPAV Servizio Osservatorio Suolo e Bonifiche , Via S. Barbara, 5/a, 31100 Treviso, TV , Italy 2 Dipartimento di Medicina Animale, Produzioni e Salute-Università degli Studi di Padova , Viale dell'Università, 16, 35020 Legnaro, PD , Italy A survey of maize fields was conducted in northeast Italy from 1986 to 2014, resulting in a dataset of 1296 records including information on wireworm damage to maize, plant-attacking species, agronomic characteristics, landscape and climate. Three wireworm species, Agriotes brevis Candeze, A. sordidus Illiger and A. ustulatus Schäller, were identified as the dominant pest species in maize fields. Over the 29-year period surveyed, no yield reduction was observed when wireworm plant damage was below 15 % of the stand. A preliminary univariate analysis of risk assessment was applied to identify the main factors influencing the occurrence of damage. A multifactorial model was then applied by using the significant factors identified. This model allowed the research to highlight the strongest factors and to analyse how the main factors together influenced damage risk. The strongest factors were: A. brevis as prevalent damaging species, soil organic matter content >5 %, rotation including meadows and/or Responsible editor: Philippe Garrigues double crops, A. sordidus as prevalent damaging species, and surrounding landscape mainly meadows, uncultivated grass and double crops. The multifactorial model also showed how the simultaneous occurrence of two or more of the aforementioned risk factors can conspicuously increase the risk of wireworm damage to maize crops, while the probability of damage to a field with no-risk factors is always low (<1 %). These results make it possible to draw risk maps to identify low-risk and high-risk areas, a first step in implementing bespoke IPM procedures in an attempt to reduce the impact of soil insecticides significantly. Agriotes brevis; Agriotes sordidus; Agriotes ustulatus; Wireworms; Maize; Damage risk factors; Multifactorial model; Mutual-fund - The implementation of integrated pest management (IPM) strategies against wireworms has been extremely difficult due to the lack of available information on the key aspects of the species concerned (Furlan 2005). IPM strategies have not played a significant role in maize and other arable crops to date (Furlan and Kreutzweiser 2015) despite the strong negative impact of using soil insecticides (i.e., neonicotinoids) to control wireworms (van der Sluijs et al. 2015). EU Directive 2009/128/EC on the sustainable use of pesticides made it compulsory to implement IPM for all annual crops in Europe from January 2014. Therefore, accurate information about IPM strategies for annual crops is urgently needed, but this information must take into account that arable farming has few resources in terms of income, labour and technology. In order to implement IPM at low cost, it is important to establish the risk factors that cause an increase in wireworm population levels and the consequent damage. This research aimed to: find out the main entomological, agronomical and climatic factors that significantly increase the risk of wireworm damage; assess the most probable maize damage level in the presence of one or more risk factors; and establish the most effective procedure to implement IPM of wireworms in maize, considering the major risk factors that increase wireworm populations. Materials and methods An extensive survey of maize fields was conducted in northeast Italy (area covered: 45.64 °N, 12.96 °E and 45.05 °N, 11.88 °E) from 1986 to 2014 (29 consecutive years), resulting in a dataset of 1296 records. Each record includes all the information in Table 1. The fields surveyed represent a balanced sample of agronomic conditions in northeast Italy. All the entomological (collection of larvae, species determination) and agronomic (crop stand and damage, cultivation practises, yield) information was directly collected with at least six inspections per field each year. Just 6 % of the rotation and landscape data was from farmer interviews (i.e., previous year data regarding fields reported for the first time and new to the authors). Data for the other parameters were collected from official regional databanks (see Soil properties). The majority of the fields surveyed were untreated (no soil insecticide or insecticide-coated seeds), except for those seeded alternately, with untreated and treated maize in strips/plots (particularly where higher wireworm densities were recorded with bait trapping method [Furlan 2014]), and those (...truncated)


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L. Furlan, B. Contiero, F. Chiarini, M. Colauzzi, E. Sartori, I. Benvegnù, F. Fracasso, P. Giandon. Risk assessment of maize damage by wireworms (Coleoptera: Elateridae) as the first step in implementing IPM and in reducing the environmental impact of soil insecticides, Environmental Science and Pollution Research, 2017, pp. 236-251, Volume 24, Issue 1, DOI: 10.1007/s11356-016-7692-z