ENY-838, a 4-page illustrated fact sheet by William H. Kern, Jr., provides useful information for keeping pests out of bird and mammal nest boxes, especially the Africanized honey bee, which has become established in Florida, and sets up colonies in smaller and lower locations which may displace wildlife that uses these locations as dens. Includes recommendations, what to do if bees have invaded your nest box, and references. Published by the UF Department of Entomology and Nematology, January 2007.
ENY-838/IN682: Keeping Africanized Honey Bees Out of Wildlife Nest Boxes (ufl.edu)
Cane toads are an introduced pest in many tropical locations around the world, but, surprisingly, there are few methods available for their control. Highly effective trapping may provide a means of controlling toads, either alone or as part of an integrated pest-management scheme. Existing cane toad trap designs use lights to lure insects to traps, and toads enter the traps to feed. Using a large, outdoor experimental arena and playback of cane toad mating calls, we examined the possibility that cane toads, like many other anurans, are attracted to conspecific mating vocalisations. We found that both male and female toads were attracted to quiet (47dB(A) at 1 m) playbacks, whereas only males responded to loud (67dB(A) at 1 m) playbacks with phonotaxis. We also tested whether playbacks broadcast from traps would be useful attractants to traps in the field. We captured three times more toads in traps with playbacks than in traps without playbacks, suggesting that playbacks can be used to enhance trapping success for toads.
Nosemosis is a serious microsporidian disease of adult European honey bees caused by the spore-forming unicellular fungi Nosema apis and Nosema ceranae. In this paper we describe the currently known techniques for nosemosis prevention and control including Good Beekeeping Practices (GBPs) and biosecurity measures (BMBs). Topics such as queen renewal, nosema-resistant bees and hygienic and control methods are described. Strong efforts are currently provided to find more a sustainable solution than the use of antibiotics. So far, it seems that the best way to approach nosemosis is given by an “integrated pest management strategy”, which foresees the contemporary application of different, specific GBPs and BMBs.
As part of a continual search for potential pathogens of insects for use in biological control or on an integrated pest management program, two bacilliform virus-like particles (VLP) of similar morphology have been found in the Mexican bean beetle Epilachna varivestis Mulsant and the house cricket, Acheta domesticus (L. ).Tissues of diseased larvae and adults of E. varivestis and all developmental stages of A. domesticus were fixed according to procedures previously described. While the bean beetles displayed no external symptoms, the diseased crickets displayed a twitching and shaking of the metathoracic legs and a lowered rate of activity.Examinations of larvae and adult Mexican bean beetles collected in the field in 1976 and 1977 in Maryland and field collected specimens brought into the lab in the fall and reared through several generations revealed that specimens from each collection contained vesicles in the cytoplasm of the midgut filled with hundreds of these VLP's which were enveloped and measured approximately 16-25 nm x 55-110 nm, the shorter VLP's generally having the greater width (Fig. 1).
Keeping Africanized Honey Bees Out of Wildlife Nest Boxes