Abstract
Growing evidence suggests that conservation agricultural practices, like no-till and cover crops, help protect annual crops from insect pests by supporting populations of resident arthropod predators. While adoption of conservation practices is growing, most field crop producers are also using more insecticides, including neonicotinoid seed coatings, as insurance against early-season insect pests. This tactic may disrupt benefits associated with conservation practices by reducing arthropods that contribute to biological control. We investigated the interaction between preventive pest management (PPM) and the conservation practice of cover cropping. We also investigated an alternative pest management approach, integrated pest management (IPM), which responds to insect pest risk, rather than using insecticides prophylactically. In a 3-year corn (Zea mays mays L.)-soy (Glycine max L.) rotation, we measured the response of invertebrate pests and predators to PPM and IPM with and without a cover crop. Using any insecticide provided some small reduction to plant damage in soy, but no yield benefit. In corn, vegetative cover early in the season was key to reducing pest density and damage, likely by increasing the abundance of arthropod predators. Further, PPM in year 1 decreased predation compared to a no-pest-management control. Contrary to our expectation, the IPM strategy, which required just one insecticide application, was more disruptive to the predator community than PPM, likely because the applied pyrethroid was more acutely toxic to a wider range of arthropods than neonicotinoids. Promoting early-season cover was more effective at reducing pest density and damage than either intervention-based strategy. Our results suggest that the best pest management outcomes may occur when biological control is encouraged by planting cover crops and avoiding broad-spectrum insecticides as much as possible. As part of a conservation-based approach to farming, cover crops can promote natural-enemy populations that can help provide biological effective control of insect pest populations.
Abstract from the paper’s OpenAlex record, shown for indexing and research. Copyright remains with the authors or the publisher. Read at the source ↗
The text the model read, with the source record’s inline markup (italics, sub- and superscripts) rendered and its character entities decoded; quote offsets refer to the raw text.
Claims 9
Claim · model-written summary
Insecticide use slightly reduced plant damage in soy.
Not reportedComparator
Verbatim
e0“Using any insecticide provided some small reduction to plant damage in soy”
Claim · model-written summary
Insecticide use provided no yield benefit in soy.
Not reportedComparator
Verbatim
e0“Using any insecticide provided some small reduction to plant damage in soy, but no yield benefit”
Claim · model-written summary
Early vegetative cover reduced pest density in corn.
- Taxon
- corn
Zea mays subsp. mayse0 - Treatment
- vegetative cover early in the seasone0
- Outcome
- pest densitye0
- Direction
- reducinge0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“In corn, vegetative cover early in the season was key to reducing pest density and damage”
Claim · model-written summary
Early vegetative cover reduced pest damage in corn.
- Taxon
- cornZea mays subsp. mayse0
- Treatment
- vegetative cover early in the seasone0
- Outcome
- damagee0
- Direction
- reducinge0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“In corn, vegetative cover early in the season was key to reducing pest density and damage”
Claim · model-written summary
PPM in year 1 decreased predation relative to no pest management.
- Taxon
- cornZea mays subsp. mayse1
- Treatment
- PPM in year 1e0
- Outcome
- predatione0
- Direction
- decreasede0
- Comparator
- no-pest-management controle0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“PPM in year 1 decreased predation compared to a no-pest-management control”
e1“corn (Zea mays mays L.)-soy (Glycine max L.) rotation”
Claim · model-written summary
IPM disrupted the predator community more than PPM.
- Taxon
- cornZea mays subsp. mayse1
- Treatment
- IPM strategye0
- Outcome
- predator communitye0
- Direction
- more disruptivee0
- Comparator
- PPMe0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“the IPM strategy, which required just one insecticide application, was more disruptive to the predator community than PPM”
e1“corn (Zea mays mays L.)-soy (Glycine max L.) rotation”
Claim · model-written summary
Early-season cover reduced pest density more effectively than intervention strategies.
- Taxon
- cornZea mays subsp. mayse1
- Treatment
- Promoting early-season covere0
- Outcome
- pest densitye0
- Direction
- reducinge0
- Comparator
- either intervention-based strategye0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Promoting early-season cover was more effective at reducing pest density and damage than either intervention-based strategy”
e1“corn (Zea mays mays L.)-soy (Glycine max L.) rotation”
Claim · model-written summary
Early-season cover reduced pest damage more effectively than intervention strategies.
- Taxon
- cornZea mays subsp. mayse1
- Treatment
- Promoting early-season covere0
- Outcome
- damagee0
- Direction
- reducinge0
- Comparator
- either intervention-based strategye0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Promoting early-season cover was more effective at reducing pest density and damage than either intervention-based strategy”
e1“corn (Zea mays mays L.)-soy (Glycine max L.) rotation”
Claim · model-written summary
The authors recommend cover crops and avoiding broad-spectrum insecticides for pest management.
- Taxon
- cornZea mays subsp. mayse1
- Outcome
- planting cover crops and avoiding broad-spectrum insecticides as much as possiblee0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“best pest management outcomes may occur when biological control is encouraged by planting cover crops and avoiding broad-spectrum insecticides as much as possible”
e1“corn (Zea mays mays L.)-soy (Glycine max L.) rotation”
The same questions in other papers
ipm · ecology: diversity · Zea mays (maize)Positive and negative results
1 in the opposite direction
- positive
climate site · pest · Zea mays (maize)Results agree
7 papers in the same direction as this paper
- positive
- positive
- positive
4 papers more in this group
See all 8 papers →Claims are grouped by organism, treatment and what was measured or targeted. A paper counts as positive when any of its claims in the group is positive.