Automated Trap Gives Reliable Pest Counts

The Issue

Traditional traps used to monitor pink bollworm populations in California cotton fields were unreliable. The numbers caught in traps varied from zero one day to hundreds the next morning. Research indicated that entry into the traps by adult males was influenced greatly by temperatures and wind speed.

What Has ANR Done?

Dr. Thomas Miller, AES Professor of Entomology with the University of California, Riverside, invented an automated pheromone trap, called Multipher®, for pink bollworm adult males. He worked with Automata, a company that supplies weather stations for temperature monitoring and remote control functions. The automated trap was integrated into a weather station, with both installed in a cotton field on the Hull Farms in Palo Verde. The station automatically summed adult male entries every 29 seconds and sent the count, along with weather data, by infrared telemetry to a computer at the farm headquarters.

The Payoff

Automated Trap Gives Pest Control Advisors Better Tool

The automated pheromone trap provided reliable results of adult male pink bollworm populations in cotton fields. This enabled pest control advisors to determine the best course of action to control pest populations.

Contact

Supporting Unit:

UCR Entomology Department
 
Dr. Thomas Miller
368 Entomology
University of California
Riverside, CA 92521
(909) 787-2278
(909) 787-3681 (Fax)
thomas.miller@ucr.edu