Arthropods on grapes benefit more from fungicide reduction than from organic farming

Abstract

BACKGROUND Pesticides are considered main contributors to global arthropod declines and therefore may decrease the provision of ecosystem services such as natural pest control. Organic farming and cultivating pest‐ and disease‐resistant varieties can allow pesticide applications and their impacts on nontarget organisms and the environment to be reduced. We investigated the effects of organic versus conventional management and fungus‐resistant versus susceptible wine grape varieties on arthropod biodiversity and pest control of grape berry moths in 32 vineyards in the Palatinate region, Germany. Hazard quotients of applied pesticides were calculated for each vineyard. RESULTS The cultivation of fungus‐resistant varieties led to significantly reduced hazard quotients and in turn enhanced abundances of natural enemies, particularly theridiid and philodromid spiders. Unexpectedly, organic management resulted in higher hazard quotients than conventional management and reduced numbers of natural enemies, particularly earwigs. Pest predation rates showed no significant differences between grape varieties or management types. CONCLUSION Widespread benefits of organic management on arthropod biodiversity found in other crops were absent in our viticultural study region. This is likely due to the dominant role of fungal diseases in viticulture, which requires high numbers of fungicide treatments under both conventional and organic viticulture. Thus, fungicide reduction through the cultivation of fungus‐resistant grape varieties is one key element to fostering the abundance of arthropods in general and beneficial arthropods in particular. Beyond vineyards, this is potentially relevant in numerous other crop types. © 2023 The Authors. Pest Management Science published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd on behalf of Society of Chemical Industry.

Agricultural Practices for Biodiversity Enhancement: Evidence and Recommendations for the Viticultural Sector

“…To prevent pathogen a acks on grapevines, products based on living microorganisms (biofungicides), bacterial derivatives, or botanicals, can be used as alternatives to synthetic fungicide applications [97]. Moreover, some studies have mentioned the planting of fungus-resistant varieties as a recommended approach to more sustainable viticulture [98][99][100]. The cultivation of these varieties led to the significant enhancement in the abundance of beneficial arthropods and predatory mite (Phytoseiidae and Tydeidae) density in both organic and conventional production types and contributed to the reduction of fungicide application [98,99].…”

“…Moreover, some studies have mentioned the planting of fungus-resistant varieties as a recommended approach to more sustainable viticulture [98][99][100]. The cultivation of these varieties led to the significant enhancement in the abundance of beneficial arthropods and predatory mite (Phytoseiidae and Tydeidae) density in both organic and conventional production types and contributed to the reduction of fungicide application [98,99]. Pennington et al [100] reported enhanced densities of Lobesia botrana predators and reduced damage to inoculated grape bunches due to a reduction in fungicide applications in grapevine cultivars resistant to powdery and downy mildew.…”

Impact of pesticides on the arthropofauna associated with potato (Solanum tuberosum) cultivation in Cusco-Peru

“…La familia más abundante en este estudio fue Cicadellidae (19,82 %), la cual pertenece al GT de los herbívoros, y posee varias especies plagas de importancia en el cultivo de la papa (Costa & Lozada, 2010;Silva et al, 2019;Santos et al, 2020;Pérez et al, 2021). Al contrastar, lo que señala la literatura científica para Cicadellidae, se ha encontrado una alta mortalidad por efecto de diversos plaguicidas (Patel, 2022;Jawad & Nawar, 2023;Reiff et al, 2023), y una alta sensibilidad a la perturbación del suelo (Silva et al, 2019;Keil & Lozada, 2021). Opuestamente en este estudio la abundancia de Cicadellidae incrementó bajo la presencia del propineb, el cual fue 1,20 veces mayor que en el fipronil y 1,23 veces mayor que en el tratamiento convencional.…”

Which temperature matters? Effects of origin, rearing and test conditions on the chemical sensitivity of Pardosa amentata

“…This is especially relevant for agroecosystems (Michalko et al, 2019;Riechert, 1999). However, pesticide applications may affect this key role (Reiff et al, 2023;Theiling & Croft, 1988). Moreover, pesticides can unintentionally reach areas outside agroecosystems (Kaur & Garg, 2014) and may also affect other spider species along with the agrobiont spiders.…”