Identification and management of thrips in pepper ( L.) crops grown in greenhouse in Tucumán

Abstract

Thrips are among the principal problems limiting the pepper production under plastic cover owing to their periodical apparition and the damage they produce. The aim of this work was to realize the taxonomic identification of the thrips and to evaluate the insecticide power of an organic compound with entomopathogenic activity for controlling them in a commercial pepper crop under plastic cover in San Isidro de Lules, Tucumán. Twenty five weekly surveys were made during the 2009 campaign in two greenhouses of pepper cv. “Margarita”. One greenhouse had an ecological management by using of an organic compound with insecticide properties which was weekly applied and the other had a conventional management by using Formetanato. Each sampling date, 54 flowers per treatment were extracted registering the presence of young and adults thrips, which were further put on microscopic preparations for the taxonomic identification. A test T for independent samples were applied to compare treatments on those dates where both treatments had infestation levels above zero. The identified adults thrips at the pepper crop were Frankliniella schultzei (Trybom) and Frankliniella occidentalis
(Pergande) (Thysanoptera-Thripidae). Of all monitoring conducted in eight values were different from zero for both treatments; among these, in 6 no significant differences were observed between treatments. It can be
concluded that the organic compound with entomopathogenic realize a similar control to the synthetic insecticide. This could be replaced by the organic product for a more adequate management in a sustainable production.