UA Entomologists Test Strategy for Delaying Insecticide Resistance

A pair of sweet potato whiteflies on a plant leaf. Whiteflies are a common crop pest in Arizona and elsewhere, and damage the state's cotton industry by weakening plants and fouling cotton gins. (Photo: Stephen Ausmus)

A team of entomologists led by University of Arizona Professor Yves Carrière has devised and implemented a new test to help farmers in their never-ending war against insect pests. Based on nearly a decade of dogged research, they've provided the first direct evidence confirming the effectiveness of the so-called refuge strategy for delaying pest resistance to insecticides.
 

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Arizona Senate President Honed Ranching Skills at UA
Steve Pierce, second from right, was a member of professor Marvin Selke's 1971 livestock judging team. Others include Selke, Howard Barnes, Steve Todd, Steve Brophy, Pierce and Mary Montgomery. (Photo courtesy UA animal sciences department.)

"Do you know why there is a rock wall around the UA?" asks Stephen Pierce. The question is directed to a stumped administrator on a recent visit by Pierce to the University of Arizona campus.

Pierce, who has just taken the reins as president of the Arizona Senate, already knows the answer. From 1968 to 1972, he was a student at the UA where he learned, among other things, about how the wall was built to keep range cattle off of the campus.

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The Wondrous World of Insects
UA entomologist Kathleen Walker heads up the Insect Discovery program to teach young students how to be gentle with insects and also to observe them. "What I'm excited about is giving them a sense of what science is really about – that it is not about an old man in a white lab coat blowing things up, but about observing and trying to understand just using what you can see and test." (Photo courtesy of Kathleen Walker)

Holding a square, plastic container, Kathleen Walker turned toward the captivated group of dozens of elementary school students seated before her. 

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New Farm Takes Root With Kids, Community
Tucson Village Farm camper enjoys the fruits of the first harvest. Photo by Brian Forbes Powell.

Leza Carter sounds a bit like a math teacher when she shares her passion for Tucson Village Farm.
 
If 10 students visit, Carter said, on average only one will have picked a tomato off a vine before and half will insist they hate tomatoes.
 
But by the end of their tour, most of the tomato haters will find they actually like the seedy fruit.
 
"It's this sort of thing - and it happens all the time - that assures me that we are onto something at Tucson Village Farm," said Carter, the nonprofit's program director.
 

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