Four sets of models are examined which represent various pairwise combinations of several methods of pest control. These methods involve the release of sterile male pests, the inundative release of parasitoids, insecticide application, pheromone trapping and food‐baited trapping with either insecticides or sterilants.
It was observed that two pest control methods will combine synergistically, and thus be complimentary, if their optimal action is at different pest densities and varies differently with pest density. The synergism thus generated by differing dependence on density, can however, be obscured if the two control methods interfere with each other in some other way, as occurs for example with the use of both insecticides and inundative release of parasitoids.