No abstract

Coupling several natural and synthetic lures with aggregation pheromones from the palm weevils Rhynchophorus palmarum and R. ferrugineus reveals a synergy that results in an increase in pest captures. The combined attraction of pure pheromones, ethyl acetate, and decaying sweet and starchy plant tissue increases the net total of mass-trapped weevils. The 2018 entrance of the red palm weevil (RPW) into South America has threatened palm-product income in Brazil and other neighboring countries. The presence of the new A1 quarantine pest necessitates the review of all available options for a sustainable mass-trapping, monitoring, and control strategy to ultimately target both weevils with the same device. The effective lure-blend set for the mass-trapping system will attract weevils in baiting and contaminating stations for entomopathogenic fungi that the same weevils will spread.

Red palm weevil (RPW) Rhynchophorus ferrugineus was described as pest from tropical

The rhizosphere is the region that has direct influence from the roots. This is the place where most of the interactions between microorganisms and plants occur. Studies involving the ecology of microbial communities from the rhizosphere became more frequent after the first reports of biological interactions of microorganisms with plants that influence physically and chemically modify the soil surrounding. According to these hypotheses, the rhizosphere mycobiota provides the development of plants through various mechanisms, direct and indirect. Thus, the objective of this review was to explain the aspects that provide characterizing these microorganisms as beneficial to plants in view of their applicability to agro-ecosystems. Therefore, it is stated that rhizospheric fungi have the solubilization of phosphorus (P), assimilating this nutrient for plants, promoting growth through the production or stimulation of the production of growth regulators such as 3-indole acetic acid, and control of phytopathogenic agents such as other filamentous fungi, and also phytonemamatodes. Therefore, it is possible to observe the importance of the constant observance of the action of these microorganisms in terms of their ecological role due to the agro-ecosystem.

Background The black palm weevil, Rhynchophorus palmarum (Linnaeus, 1758) (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) is considered the most important palm pest in the Americas. In the State of Bahia, Brazil, it is parasitized by tachinid flies (Diptera: Tachinidae). During 2019–2020, larvae and pupae of R. palmarum were collected from African oil palms (Elaeis guineensis Jacq.) in the municipalities of Jaguaripe and Taperoá, Bahia State, Brazil. Puparia and adult tachinids of two apparent morphospecies, with considerable differences in body size, were obtained from the R. palmarum immatures, which led to initially assume that we had collected two different tachinid species. Results Morphological identification as well as COI gene sequencing showed that the two apparent morphospecies belong to a single taxonomic species, Billaea rhynchophorae (Blanchard, 1937) (Diptera: Tachinidae). Conclusions Occurrence of intraspecific size variability in B. rhynchophorae was reported, as well as performed the first genetic sequencing for this species. The reason of the size variation could not be determined but some possible causes and implications are discussed.