NCERA193: NCR-193: IPM Strategies for Arthropod Pests and Diseases in Nurseries and Landscapes
Statement of Issues and Justification
Members of NCR-193 focus on Integrated Pest Management (IPM) strategies for insect and disease pests of ornamental plants in nurseries, landscapes, and urban forests. Key research and technology transfer goals of members include development, evaluation, and integration of the cultural, chemical, and biological control tactics that are the foundation of IPM programs. To address these goals, specific research objectives have focused on biology of key pests (e.g., Glynn et al. 2004; Weston and Diaz 2005; Flowers et al. 2002, 2004, 2006; Johnson and Williamson 2006), approaches to pest monitoring and prediction (Guo 2003; Herms 2004), assessment of new pesticide chemistries and application technology (e.g. Smitley et al. 2005; Williamson and Johnson 2005) stress factors predisposing plants to pest attack (Hale et al. 2005), screening germplasm for pest resistance (e.g., Herms 2002a; Weston and Desurmont 2002), elucidating mechanisms of host plant resistance (Bonello et al. 2003), cultural practices to enhance plant health (e.g., Herms 2002b; Blodgett et al. 2005; Lloyd et al. 2006), and implementation of biological control (e.g., Sadof and Snyder 2005; Rebek et al. 2005).NCR-193 was formed in 1997 through the merger of NCR-98 and NCR-43. The directive provided a highly successful forum for plant pathologists and entomologists to discuss IPM programs for insects and diseases of ornamental plants, exchange research results and extension information, formulate complementary research objectives, establish interdisciplinary, multi-state collaborations, and avoid duplication of effort. This merger has fostered communication and facilitated interactions of entomologists and phytopathologists throughout the country, promoted awareness of regional and inter-regional arthropod and disease pest problems, fostered research collaborations to understand their potential impact and develop mitigation tactics and strategies, and resulted in workshops and other inter-state outreach programs for green industry professionals. These impacts are documented in the outcomes section of the proposal.
A great benefit of NCR-193 is that it provides a pre-positioned organizational framework necessary to generate a multi-state, collaborative research and outreach response to unforeseen and unpredictable emergence of key pests. For example, sudden oak death and emerald ash borer were unknown to science five years ago, but have come to dominate the research and outreach efforts of several members of NCR 193 (including several collaborative multi-institutional research projects and a coordinated, multi-state, multi-agency outreach partnership between Michigan State University, Purdue University, The Ohio State University, University of Wisconsin, and USDA/APHIS).
The annual economic activity of the green industry (nursery, landscape, turfgrass, and floriculture) has been estimated to exceed $147 billion. In the past two decades, public interest in ornamental plants and the demand for high quality nursery stock has more than tripled. The nursery and floriculture industry is the fastest growing segment of US agriculture. In 1995, $27 billion was spent at retail and mail order stores for landscape plants and associated products, a 20% increase since 1993. In 1999, over 21 million households spent over $16.8 billion on professional landscape, lawn and tree care services. The livelihood of over 600,000 horticulturists, nurserymen, landscape architects, arborists, garden center operators, pest control specialists, urban foresters, and many others is tied directly to the ornamentals industry. The value of landscape plants extends far beyond the substantial economic activity generated by their sale and maintenance. They are an integral part of, and provide critical services to, the human environment. Properly placed and maintained plants can reduce energy costs, absorb noise and air pollutants, purify water, reduce soil erosion, increase ecological stability, and provide wildlife habitat. Landscape plants are integral to the human outdoor experience, whether it be relaxing in the yard, playing a round of golf, or walking in a park. Ornamental plants increase property values and foster community pride. The health, aesthetic quality, and utility of landscape plants are decreased by a wide diversity of arthropod pests and pathogenic disease organisms, which stimulates widespread interest and activity in mitigating the negative influences of these problems. Nurseries, homeowners, landscapers, municipal governments, and tree care professionals strive to grow and maintain healthy and aesthetically pleasing plants, while reducing the use of conventional pesticides by embracing integrated pest management (IPM) programs. As the ornamentals industry has expanded, so has the complexity of managing disease and insect problems. Many of these problems are national rather than local in scope as widespread shipment and planting of ornamental plants has resulted in regional, national, and international distribution of key pests. Furthermore, the great diversity of ornamental plants produced in nurseries and planted in landscapes, each with their own complement of pest problems, means that no individual researcher or state can hope to address them all. Interactions, collaborations, and complementary objectives resulting from NCR-193 meetings have allowed entomologists and plant pathologists to address a much wider variety of key problems more efficiently and quickly, while avoiding duplication of efforts. The implementation of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Food Quality Protection Act (FQPA) of 1996 has resulted in cancellation of registrations of key broad-spectrum insecticides formerly used to manage pests on ornamental plants. However, a number of new-generation insecticides have emerged to replace these, but their range of activity tends to be much more specific and their residual activity much shorter. EPA has also increased emphasis on registration of biologically-based insecticides. Increased emphasis on reduced-risk pesticides creates significant opportunities for incorporating these products into IPM programs. However, detailed information about pest biology and ecology, pest response to these products, and effective technology transfer to pest managers will be required in order to do so effectively. Exotic, invasive insects and diseases such as emerald ash borer, sudden oak death, Asian longhorned beetle, dogwood anthracnose, powdery mildew, and hemlock woolly adelgid that increasingly threaten North American forests also significantly impact the green industry. The spread of invasive organisms has been facilitated at times by accidental shipment of infested nursery stock, resulting in quarantines that have negative economic impacts on nurseries. Furthermore, urban environments have been the site of major eradication and suppression efforts for invasive pests such as emerald ash borer, gypsy moth, and Asian longhorned beetle. The rapid response to emerald ash borer and sudden oak death emphasize the benefits of NCR-193, as its members have played key roles in developing and implementing coordinated multi-state research and outreach programs. For example, Bonello (Ohio State University) has coordinated survey efforts for sudden oak death in Ohio and Indiana. Herms (Ohio State University) serves on the USDA Emerald Ash Borer National Science Panel, and Herms, Bonello (Ohio State University) and Smitley (Michigan State University) have initiated a collaborative research project to investigate variation in ash resistance to emerald ash borer (Herms et al. 2005). While Herms and Smitley have collaborated to evaluate insecticide options for emerald ash borer (Smitley et al. 2006). Smitley, Sadof, Williamson and Herms have coordinated and integrated the emerald ash borer outreach programs for Michigan State University, Purdue, University of Wisconsin, and Ohio State University. As the geographic scale and impact of insect and disease problems of ornamental plants continues to expand as the green industry continues to grow, so does the significance of outcomes and impacts provided by NCR-193. The need to coordinate regional and national research and outreach programs to address these problems is at an all-time high, and NCR-193 plays a key role in facilitating these efforts. This interdisciplinary committee has proven to be an invaluable forum for developing coordinated, complementary programs needed to address a great diversity of pest problems, while avoiding duplication of efforts, in an era of increasingly limited resources, as well as facilitating collaborative, interdisciplinary, multi-state collaborations necessary to address problems of regional and national significance.
Our objectives focus more on the conceptual rather than specific in order to develop generalized frameworks from which we can address the great diversity of pest management issues that emanate from hundreds of host species, several times as many pests (across multiple kingdoms), all interacting in vastly different management systems, including nurseries, landscapes, urban and natural forests, across all regions of the country. By necessity, we focus on complementation and avoidance of duplication of effort, which has dramatically improved our ability to address the great diversity of pest issues our stakeholders must confront.
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