A day with no articles on the status of the fall armyworm infestation brings news that suggests we are ready to go into a panic phase: “The Council of Agriculture yesterday launched a new round of compulsory measures to prevent the spread of fall armyworms that involve spraying pesticide in all the areas where they have been sighted” (“Fall armyworm fight enters new phase,” June 19, page 4).
It appears that nobody at the council has bothered to read either the meeting report on the “Consultative Meeting on Fall Armyworm in Asia” from March 20 to 22 in Bangkok or a publication by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization, titled “Integrated Management of the Fall Armyworm on Maize: A Guide for Farmer Field Schools in Africa.”
These publications suggest that the use of insecticides might be counterproductive, because they are likely to damage organisms that kill the armyworm, and might harm people and livestock.
The first cited publication goes as far as stating: “Once FAW [the fall armyworm] has arrived in a country, it will be there to stay. Eradication is not an option given the biology and ecology of the insect. Sound and sustainable management practices need to be fine-tuned for farmers and other actors to manage FAW in the short and long term.”
Moreover, poorly controlled insecticide use might lead to increased pesticide resistance in future generations of the armyworm.
The earlier phase of burying larvae might also be misguided.
One reason for this is that mature larvae go underground to pupate and emerge as adults; hence if the burial is not deep enough and takes place close to the point at which larvae are almost ready to pupate, then those that are not buried deep enough might be helped rather than hindered.
Moreover, a rush to bury might exclude effective measures — for example, a procedure that appears to have had some success in the collection of dead larvae.
Early death in many cases is due to parasitoids and infection, so using the remains to infect future generations might curb propagation without wreaking havoc on the environment.
Government announcements keep emphasizing that the life cycle of the insect is about 30 days, although most of the literature seems to indicate that it is between 30 and 65 days, and depends on temperature and humidity, as well as the plant on which the larvae feed.
Moreover, there are blind spots in our knowledge. I found no indication of how long it takes from the emergence of the adult female to its likely fertilization, or how long the interval from fertilization to oviposition might be.
For example, if the interval is less than 10 days and wind-borne female moths travel about 100km per day, then migration paths over the ocean for more than 1,000km are not consistent with wind-borne migration.
As far as I have been able to gauge from the news, there has been no effort to estimate the age of the larvae that have been found in an area.
Since larvae are said to go through five stages of growth, it must be possible to gauge their ages by appropriate testing. Not doing so might be a major mistake from more than one point of view.
A key tenet of local control efforts seems to be that the larvae must be destroyed before they reach the age of 10 days, presumably because after that the probability of becoming pupae is very high.
If several fields are contaminated in one area, it would then make sense to deal with fields with larvae close to 10 days old before dealing with those with larvae averaging three days old.
However, such a sensible allocation of effort is not possible if the average age of larvae cannot be determined.
A related issue is the presumption that the only way moths can migrate is by wind. History records many instances in which pests were carried across great distances by floating debris, vegetable matter cargo, passenger ships, trucks and airplanes.
Data on the order in which infested sites are found and the age of the larvae when first reported might be useful in determining whether the presumed mode of travel or some alternative is in play.
The only two places that have not yet been documented as infected are Kaohsiung and Nantou County. I do not include the offshore islands, since these are relatively small and further east.
If we knew how many documented sites there are by county and the age of the larvae when first reported, we could reasonably guess the presumed direction of the moth-bearing wind and infer their likely source.
Kaohsiung is a very active port, so casual introduction from shipping or by wind would be equally as likely.
Nantou has no coastline, so transport by ship would be impossible, unless goods imported to the coast were then shipped by truck. As the nation’s second-largest county by land area, it would be more likely than most other counties to be invaded by wind-born moths.
Despite financial incentives to report infestations, none have yet been reported, so wind-borne spread might not be a sure bet. Not gathering and sharing relevant information might keep people in ignorance.
The government has offered a reward of NT$10,000 to “people who make a confirmed report of the pest until tomorrow.” In all the publicity I have seen related to that offer, I have seen no mention of the fact that the larvae are nocturnal and, accordingly, are seldom easy to spot during the day.
That omission, coupled with the fact that most of the photographs of the larvae available on the Internet are shown in well-illuminated backgrounds, is not likely to lead to fruitful activity.
I am also bewildered that the government has not seen fit to create a Web site that posts locations with confirmed infestations along with the date of such confirmations.
That information, along with data on wind direction and the plants on which the armyworms have been found, would certainly make it more likely that people, especially farmers, would look in the most likely places from which the moths might have spread or to which the moths might have moved, and avoided the time and cost involved in searching in areas remote from such sources or targets.
The expense of maintaining such a Web site for a few days or weeks does not appear overwhelming, and if things really go badly, it could be maintained in the longer term.
Emilio Venezian is a former visiting professor at Feng Chia University.
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