The fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (J.E. Smith, 1797) (Lepidoptera: Noctuidae), is the most important noctuid pest in the Americas and has recently become an invasive pest in Africa. A detailed record of S. frugiperda's host plants is essential to better understand the biology and ecology of this pest, conduct future studies, and develop Integrated Pest Management programmes. In this study, we collected and systematically arranged the fragmented bibliographic information on S. frugiperda feeding records. Furthermore, we registered new records of host plants for S. frugiperda based on eight years of surveys in Brazil. The literature review and surveys resulted in a total of 353 S. frugiperda larval host plant records belonging to 76 plant families, principally Poaceae (106), Asteraceae (31) and Fabaceae (31). The literature search revealed 274 (77 % of total) bibliographic records, while 82 (23 %) are new records from surveys in Brazil. The new comprehensive and updated host plant list will improve our understanding of pest biology and management, as well as facilitate future studies on this pest.

SignificanceDecades of research have fostered the now-prevalent assumption that noncrop habitat facilitates better pest suppression by providing shelter and food resources to the predators and parasitoids of crop pests. Based on our analysis of the largest pest-control database of its kind, noncrop habitat surrounding farm fields does affect multiple dimensions of pest control, but the actual responses of pests and enemies are highly variable across geographies and cropping systems. Because noncrop habitat often does not enhance biological control, more information about local farming contexts is needed before habitat conservation can be recommended as a viable pest-suppression strategy. Consequently, when pest control does not benefit from noncrop vegetation, farms will need to be carefully comanaged for competing conservation and production objectives.

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The western corn rootworm ( Diabrotica virgifera virgifera LeConte) (WCR) is a major insect pest of corn ( Zea mays L.) in the United States (US) and is highly adaptable to multiple management tactics. A low level of WCR field-evolved resistance to pyrethroid insecticides has been confirmed in the US western Corn Belt by laboratory dose-response bioassays. Further investigation has identified detoxification enzymes as a potential part of the WCR resistance mechanism, which could affect the performance of insecticides that are structurally related to pyrethroids, such as organophosphates. Thus, the responses of pyrethroid-resistant and -susceptible WCR populations to the commonly used pyrethroid bifenthrin and organophosphate dimethoate were compared in active ingredient bioassays. Results revealed a relatively low level of WCR resistance to both active ingredients. Therefore, a simulated aerial application bioassay technique was developed to evaluate how the estimated resistance levels would affect performance of registered rates of formulated products. The simulated aerial application technique confirmed pyrethroid resistance to formulated rates of bifenthrin whereas formulated dimethoate provided optimal control. Results suggest that the relationship between levels of resistance observed in dose-response bioassays and actual efficacy of formulated product needs to be further explored to understand the practical implications of resistance.

The fall armyworm, Spodoptera frugiperda (J. E. Smith, 1797), is the most important noctuid pest in the Americas and has recently become an invasive pest in Africa and in India. Having a detailed and standardized record of the biology and the larval development of S. frugiperda will be critical to further studies on integrated pest management, toxicology, and applied ecology. This study reports the temporal and morphological parameters of the immature stages of S. frugiperda for larvae fed on artificial diet under controlled conditions (25±1 °C, 70±10% RH and 14 hour photophase). The survival of the egg, larval, prepupal and pupal stages was 97.40, 98.33, 99.32 and 97.95%, respectively. The average duration of the egg, larval, prepupal and pupal stages were 2.69, 13.73, 1.43, and 9.24 days, respectively. All larvae passed through six instars, with significantly slower larval development for females. However, females had faster pupal development and heavier pupae, thus total time from egg to adult was not significantly different between sexes. With the growing importance of this highly polyphagous species, centralizing the fragmented information in the literature and standardizing its rearing methods will improve and facilitate future studies on this pest.