According to Sabri Ben-Achour from National public Radio, the brown marmorated stink bug has become a major threat to farmers in the mid-Atlantic states. Introduced from Asia in the 1990s, this bug has spread at plague like proportions in the United States and feed on farmer’s fruits and vegetables leaving them damaged and disfigured. For farmer Bob Black, the stink bug destroyed over 50% of his Pink Lady apples. Because this bug is so detrimental to his livelihood, Black has tried using fertilizers to kill the bug but they are resistant to it.
Like the fertilizers, this brown marmorated stink bug is highly resistant to predation because “they simply arrived without their natural enemies” (npr). In Asia their main enemy was the Trissolcus wasp. To combat this plague of stink bugs, scientists are now working on growing insects in petri dishes to see if they can fight invasive pests that have gone ramped, specifically the stink bug. These insects are grown carefully in light, temperature and humidity controlled conditions. They are specifically exposing the predatory wasp to the stink bug because in Asia they successfully destroy the bug. The wasps lay their eggs inside of the stink bug eggs and the wasps hatch and feed on the bug and when the bug egg hatches all that is left is the wasp. The scientists are hoping that this experiment will help the farmers like Bob Black to save their crops and not have to worry anymore about the mamorated stink bug.
This article relates to our class because it describes how a new species is introduced into another environment and then unexpected consequences occur because of it. This stink bug spread like the plague in the United States and now new experiments need to be conducted to rid the States from the bug. It is the perfect example of how one ecological event ultimately leads to another. Also, it briefly talks about how experiments are conducted, under what conditions, and what the experiment hopes to achieve. I liked this article because I had no idea stink bugs were such a huge problem to farmers, or even a that they were problem at all. Hopefully this new experiment will be the answer to farmers. Lets also hope that introducing this wasp, like the stink bug, will not bring about equally negative consequences in the future.
Blog By: Kaitlyn McHugh
Article & Picture Reference: Sabri Ben-Achour, npr – April 26, 2011
http://www.npr.org/2011/04/26/135635100/can-wasps-squash-the-stink-bug-plague? ft=1&f=1025
wow, cool information, I really hope that that kind of method will be implemented so that we can get rid of those nasty stink bugs? they really infested in our garden.
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