Duration: 03/01/2003 to 09/30/2005

Administrative Advisor(s):

NIFA Reps:

Non-Technical Summary

Statement of Issues and Justification

Apple in the eastern United States is a high value crop, approaching an annual farm-gate value of $450 million with production on 6,582 farms. Apples are grown for both fresh and processing markets, and are an important component in the diets of infants and children. Apple production is a cornerstone of the regions agriculture that provides a large quantity of fresh fruit and fruit products, contributes to agri-tourism, and offers bucolic amenities to an increasingly urban and suburban landscape. During the last several years, fruit growers in New York, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey have suffered severe financial losses because infestations by internal fruit feeding Lepidoptera have led to numerous loads of apples being rejected by fresh fruit markets and processing plants. The escalating incidence of severe fruit damage in commercial apple orchards caused by internal fruit feeding Lepidoptera clearly poses a threat to the continued viability of this industry. Growers in the northeastern United States are already threatened by future changes in the availability of broad spectrum, relatively inexpensive, effective insecticides such as organophosphates, because of changes resulting from the implementation of the Food Quality Protection Act. In addition, they are faced with low commodity prices because of increased domestic and foreign competition, and higher production costs. If this new pest control crisis is not solved quickly, it could hasten the decline of this already beleaguered, important regional agricultural industry. Furthermore, if growers are forced to use harsh insecticides, such as synthetic pyrethroids, to control these infestations, more than 30 years of IPM research and implementation may be subverted.

Types of Activities

This proposal is a team effort from three of the leading fruit production states to join together to solve a problem of importance to the whole region. Prior to the start of the grant, the researchers will meet together to finalize common protocols to be used in each of the three states. All of the states will conduct studies on both objectives. The specific amount of work done on each species of the pest complex, codling moth, oriental fruit moth, and lesser appleworm, will be designed to meet the specific needs of each state.

Management strategies will be developed for the specific suite of pests of apple occurring in the representative growing regions of each state participating in this project. Although the fundamental approaches underlying these strategies will be similar in all cases, the specific ways in which they will be constructed and implemented will naturally differ according to each state's particular crop, pest complex, and market situations. The benefits of evaluating comparable management programs in multiple states of the eastern fruit region will derive not only from the minor biological differences in the respective systems, but also from the distinct extension/audience interactions that operate in each of these areas. Each of the participating investigators fulfills a specific role in their state's extension education process, and the diversity of scenarios represented by this range of efforts will create a valuable opportunity to assess the value and effectiveness of this project's activities in a range of extension settings.

Because multiple farm sites will be involved in the implementation of these management programs in each growing region, it is possible that 10 or more separate grower operations could be participants in each state. Previous interactions associated with this problem have already determined a number of growers that will be involved and the management challenges that will be needed at each site. In addition, individual conferences will be scheduled with each of the cooperators before and after the growing season, to assess their individual management strategies and program successes and weaknesses at the end of the season. These conferences will include any private consultants, fieldmen, or orchard managers that normally work with each grower to oversee their pest management program.

During the off-season periods of this project, the overall strategies, strengths and failings of these programs will be evaluated using several different feedback methods in each state. Overviews of the program histories, preferably representative of each state's affected growing region, will be discussed at roundtable discussions with all the participating consultants and orchard managers, to compare notes and make plans for any changes identified for subsequent seasons. Similarly, grower panels will be held at winter fruit meetings and in-depth schools, as discussion forums on selected aspects of these programs.

Objectives

1. Provide apple growers with effective ways of controlling internal fruit feeding Lepidoptera that are consistent with and integral to existing apple pest management systems
   
2. Develop better understanding of internal Lepidoptera distribution in time and space, and susceptibility to insecticides so that control tactics can be made more robust and effective
   
3. To assess, from the perspective of industry members and researchers, the strengths and failings of tested management tactics and to extend successful tactics to a wide audience
   
4. 
   

Expected Outputs, Outcomes and/or Impacts

Our results will be incorporated into existing pest management programs in several ways, but will rely primarily on traditional Cooperative Extension education program methods. The fastest way to provide updates to extension personnel and growers is through newsletter articles and web-based information resources. All states involved with this project send out timely newsletters and/or maintain current online information sites. All of the investigators participating in this proposal provide significant input into their individual states' Tree Fruit Production Guides. These guides, which are made available to growers, are updated annually (NJ, NY) or biennially (PA), and will have the greatest day-to-day impact on grower practices because they are routinely consulted during the growing season to assist in the process of management decision-making. We expect that growers successfully adopting improved management programs will be able to maintain effective, sustainable and economic control of internal Lepidoptera pests of apple without the recurrent control failures stemming from either resistance to conventional classes of insecticides that have lost efficacy through overuse, or improperly timed programs of newer selective materials that require a closer correspondence of application with specific stages of pest development. Enhanced fruit quality will be easily determined on the fruit packing line, and fruit growers may not have to struggle every year to maintain the competitive edge that allows them to remain in business.

Projected Participation

View Appendix E: Participation

Literature Cited

Attachments

Land Grant Participating States/Institutions

NC, NJ, NY, OH, PA, VA

Non Land Grant Participating States/Institutions