Brown Marmorated Stink Bugs and Other Invasive Insects

Brown Marbled Stink Bugs and Other Invasive Insects

Brown marbled stink bugs and other invasive insects deserve all the attention and money due to their resistance to chemicals and their increasing numbers.

The Impact of Beetles on Crops

Beetles damage vegetables, fruits, and nuts, especially in North America. This brings losses. We need long-term solutions to ensure food crops, farms, and the environment are protected. Without such measures, the United States could experience food shortages due to poor harvests. The media, environmentalists, governments, researchers, and other stakeholders have a major role to play in keeping beetles from causing massive crop destruction. It’s starting to invade homes and buildings in Michigan, but it is quite difficult to manage and control.

Managing Beetles in Urban Areas

Since the accidental introduction of the Halyomorpha halys in Pennsylvania from Asia in the 1990s, it has been spreading rapidly in several counties (Cornelius et al., 2016). Property owners in urban areas are overwhelmed regarding the insects’ invasion to their home gardens and commercial farms.

Alternatives to Pesticide Use

The use of pesticides for pest control can result in serious health consequences to human beings and the environment. Some of the dangers include acute toxicity, chronic toxicity, poisoning, and irritation of body organs, coughing, and death. If spraying the insects is effective but causes human health hazards, it is not worthy to utilize such a method since its impacts are quite harmful. Instead, other measures such as biological control and management of the bugs should be adopted. However, emergency measures that reduce spoiling crops such as traps monitoring and employing of attractants should be accepted, especially in regions with high populations.

Understanding the Insect’s Lifecycle

Another measure is to understand clearly the insect’s lifecycle taken to complete their development in addition to the identification of the native and non-native bugs and insects. Instead of using chemicals that can augment pollution in the environment, more research is necessary, such as the insect’s phenology and their preferred host plants (Cornelius et al., 2016). It can help farmers select the crops to grow in certain areas depending on the population of bugs invading the plants.

Natural Enemies as Control

In addition, instead of using pesticides that have harmful effects, identification of natural enemies and their incorporation into the management programs that aim at reducing the bugs and other insects should be taken over. Some of the predators such as wasps can destroy large numbers of bugs and their eggs. Other predators include katydids, earwigs, jumping spiders, and lady beetles.

Considerations for Environmental Impact

If the risks were to other insects and natural ecosystems, it would not be worthy to utilize pesticides since their destruction negatively influences the natural ecosystem. Chemical pesticides are great pollutants of the environment as they tend to travel to unintended areas after their application. For instance, they find their way into water sources, soil, and atmosphere leading to chemical pollution. They bring to the depletion of nutrients in the soil as a result of poor crop production.

Promoting Organic Control of Harmful Organisms

Even if chemical pesticides may be effective in controlling stink bugs, they should not be employed due to the negative impacts on the environment and other insects. Some insects such as bees and ladybirds are useful in pollination and insect control respectively (Cornelius et al., 2016). If a control method will advance to the destruction of the environment and other insects, they should be completely avoided. Therefore, it is necessary to lessen contamination of soil with chemicals but instead invest heavily in organic control of harmful organisms.

Reference

Cornelius, M.L., et al. (2016). Parasitism and predation on sentinel egg masses of the brown marmorated stink bug (Hemiptera: Pentatomidae) in three vegetable crops: Importance of dissections for evaluating the impact of native parasitoids on an exotic pest. Environmental Entomology, 45(1), 1536-1542. Retrieved from https://academic.oup.com/ee/article-abstract/45/6/1536/2404574/Parasitism-and-Predation-on-Sentinel-Egg-Masses-of?redirectedFrom=fulltext