• Southern IPM blog posts

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Study Shows IPM Reduces Cockroach Allergens in Schools

Nobody wants cockroaches crawling around the kitchen. Yet in many schools, that is exactly what cafeteria staff have to live with, even after the pest control professional has come to spray. As administrators from two North Carolina school districts found out while participating in a 2003-04 study, integrated pest management can rid the school of pests—and keep them away.

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Does Herbicide Use Encourage “Superweeds”?

When Roundup® entered the market in the early 1970s, it seemed to be an herbicide dream come true. Inexpensive, effective and non-persistent in the environment, glyphosate, the main ingredient in Roundup®, gave most users few things to complain about. Roundup® was cheaper than many other herbicides, so farmers could use it throughout the growing season with little economic impact. Farmers also enjoyed weed-free fields, and with the introduction of Roundup Ready crops in the 1990s, spraying weeds in developing fields became easier. National Park Service staff even use glyphosate to kill invasive weeds in the forest because it effectively controls vegetation and has low mammalian toxicity.

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Venerable NY IPM Program On the Ropes

The New York IPM Program, one of the first state IPM programs and a model for many others, faces extinction. After three decades of impact developing crop protection methods and teaching farmers how to use them, enhancing  environmental protection, human health AND profitability, the program faces the budgetary axe of  Governor Paterson, whose new budget zeroes it out.

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New Trap May Shed Light on Undetected Bed Bug Populations

Initially, dry ice, hand warmers, and chemical lures may not seem to have much in common, but according to researchers at Rutgers University, together they make a good bed bug trap. According to a 2009 refereed article published in the Journal of Economic Entomology, an effective attractant for bed bugs may help detect early infestations or confirm that populations have been eliminated.

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IPM Centers a No-Show in the President’s 2011 Budget

President Obama’s USDA budget for fiscal year 2011 was released early this week, and does not contain any request for the Integrated Research, Education, and Extension Competitive Grants Program (Section 406). This program, often abbreviated as “Section 406″, has been the funding source for several major IPM programs, including Regional IPM Centers, Crops at Risk (CAR), Risk Avoidance and Mitigation Program (RAMP), and the Methyl Bromide Transitions (MBT) program.

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University Extension takes a hit nationwide

As states continue to struggle with tight budgets, one of the casualties is often state University Extension programs. Delta Farm Press editorial director Hembree Brandon explains how, in several states, Extension specialists are leaving universities for the private sector, and universities are favoring high dollar research grants at the expense of small Extension budgets. Can research and extension afford to be mutually exclusive? Click here to read the article.

Researchers Find Foe for Small Hive Beetle

In the winter issue of Southern Exposure, you’ll find a story about a relatively new pest that has been “bugging” bees in the southeast. The pest, the small hive beetle, is too small for the eye to see, but big enough to bully entire colonies into leaving their nests.

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School Environmental Protection Act: What does it mean for school IPM?

The blog post below was written by Mike Merchant, urban entomologist at Texas AgriLife Extension Service, in response to the recent introduction of H.R. 4159: the School Environmental Protection Act.  Those who are not familiar with the bill can click here to read it. The bill seeks to reduce or eliminate pesticide use in schools. The bill has both its proponents and its critics.

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A Tale of Unintended Consequences

In a small niche of the forests of China, Korea and Japan, the Asian longhorned beetle evolved unnoticed. A hardwood tree pest with a black and white specked abdomen and long antennae, it survived in a pocket of hardwood trees amidst a largely evergreen Asian forest. Because the longhorned beetle feeds on the heartwood of hardwood trees only, the beetles’ populations remained low.

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Does invasive always mean “bad”?

A post on Slate.com by Rebecca Tuhus-Dubrow might be a good starting point to consider a discussion of whether invasive species are always necessarily undesirable. Don’t Sweat the Invasion -Why foreign plants and animals may not be that bad Read more »