Natural pest management

Alternative to pesticides

Pesticides have detrimental effects on humans, nature, and beneficial insects. An alternative solution is the use of biological pest control, i.e. natural enemies of pest insects that locate the pests on the plants and kill them. It is a nature-friendly way to suppress pest survival and population development. Some plants release volatile organic compounds (VOC) in response to attack by herbivores, that result in increased attraction of natural enemies. However, increasing these indirect defense mechanisms in crop plants has received relatively little attention in breeding programs.

Variation in cabbage

In this report we explore the possibility of increasing the attraction of natural enemies by crop plants through breeding. For that, we investigated if natural variation for attraction is present in a crop and its wild relatives, in this case cabbage. We found that there is variation for both attraction of natural enemies and volatile emission, that could potentially be used for breeding plants with enhanced attraction.

What's next?

Further studies should explore how enhanced attraction relates to the success of natural enemies, to investigate if it would indeed lead to a successful control of pest insects. Identified attractive and non-attractive accessions of the same species could be used to start breeding programs.