Science panel: Moth eradication remains possible

Issue Date: May 23, 2007

By Dave Kranz
CFBF Communications/News Division

There's still time to eradicate the light brown apple moth from California, according to scientists advising state and federal agencies.

The 10-member panel concluded three days of meetings in San Jose last week by recommending that government agencies pursue eradication, rather than trying simply to control the moth.

A pest that threatens a wide variety of California-grown fruit, vegetable and nursery crops, the light brown apple moth has been trapped in nine counties, mostly in the Bay Area and Central Coast regions. Plant quarantines and certification requirements have been instituted to try to prevent the moth from spreading further.

The "technical working group," composed of scientists from the United States, Australia and New Zealand, recommended continued use of the pesticide chlorpyrifos to fight the moth where it's found.

At the epicenter of the apple moth infestation, Santa Cruz County, nursery owners worry about the recommendation.

Dave Cavanaugh, who owns a nursery in Watsonville and co-chairs the Santa Cruz County Farm Bureau legislative committee, says use of chlorpyrifos has implications for nurseries that sell flowering plants.

"This particular chemical would burn the flowers and the foliage, rendering them unsellable, so obviously for the nursery industry this is a major concern," he said.

The science panel said organically approved insecticides such as Bacillus thuringiensis and spinosad could be used against the apple moth, but that only chlorpyrifos killed the moth in all its life stages.

The panel also recommended a stepped-up research effort to determine the effectiveness of other treatments, including the use of insect pheromones to disrupt apple moth mating and of sterile moths to breed with fertile females.

In testimony presented to the science panel, California Farm Bureau Federation director of international trade and plant health Rayne Thompson cited several challenges in fighting the moth.

"Identifying and establishing funding sources to deal with both long-term and short-term compliance and to develop better biological controls, outreach, chemical compounds and evaluation of foreign trade implications affecting introduction of damaging pests is critical," she said.

San Mateo County Farm Bureau Executive Administrator Jack Olsen said the moth invasion reinforces Farm Bureau efforts to enhance border and port inspections for invasive pests and diseases, and to shift oversight of those inspections from the Department of Homeland Security back to the U.S. Agriculture Department.

"This really strengthens our arguments to returning (the inspections to USDA) and also doing sound, solid research so if something does get here, we know how to react quickly enough," Olsen said.

For the latest information about the light brown apple moth, visit the CFBF Web site: www.cfbf.com/lbam.

(CFBF Media Assistant Lora Sotelo contributed to this report. Dave Kranz is manager of media services for the California Farm Bureau Federation. He may be contacted at dkranz@cfbf.com.)

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