Similar to the sterile navel orangeworm project, pink bollworm sterilization efforts had issues at first too. California Pistachio Research Board Manager Bob Klein noted the same problems as UC Cooperative Extension Specialist Houston Wilson did with the performance of sterile NOW moths in their pilot project. The most prominent issue research is showing on the project is that the sterile moths are not showing up in traps after being released.
Klein said he recently learned of some similar stats involving the effort on pink bollworm that was just declared eradicated. “I saw some data from the California Department of Food and Agriculture the other day and they showed the trap rates on sterile pink bollworm were quite low,” Klein said. “Not as low as we are seeing right now in NOW…but they were trapping only hundreds of the millions that were released.”
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