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ARS Home » Southeast Area » Poplarville, Mississippi » Southern Horticultural Research Unit » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #308270
Title: Principles and practices of integrated pest management on cotton in the lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas

Author
item Adamczyk, John
item Greenberg, Shoil
item Armstrong, John

Submitted to: Integrated Pest Management and Pest Control
Publication Type: Book / Chapter
Publication Acceptance Date: 2/3/2012
Publication Date: 2/24/2012
Citation: Adamczyk Jr, J.J., Greenberg, S.M., Armstrong, J.S. 2012. Principles and practices of integrated pest management on cotton in the lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas. In: Larramendy, Marcelo, Soloneski, Sonia, editors. Integrated Pest Management and Pest Control - Current and Future Tactics. 978-953-51-0050-8. DOI: 10.5772/31467.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: Sustainable agriculture is ecologically sound, economically viable, socially just, and humane. These four goals for sustainability can be applied to all aspects of any agricultural system, from production and marketing, to processing and consumption. Integrated Pest Management (IPM) may be considered a key component of a sustainable agriculture system. This publication reviews recent advances in the development of IPM programs for cotton in the Lower Rio Grande Valley of Texas. We describe annual losses caused by arthropod pests in general and by specific key insects pests, briefly showed sampling of insect populations and cotton growth stages, which importance of the proper timing of scouting procedures and treatments; and economic threshold harmfulness (ETH) for optimizing control and minimizing risk from insects. We describe effectiveness of cotton insecticides; transgenically modified cotton; microbial insecticides; native, most widely-distributed and augmentative releases of beneficial insects; and cultural control techniques for cotton insects. We also show cotton diseases and weed controls. IPM is a process that considers all control options in the proportion shown in the model of a pyramid, and it can be used to demonstrate how growers might productively construct their pest management programs.