Brief Summary of Minutes of Annual Meeting

Meeting was called to order at 8:32 AM by Chair Isaacs Initial Business David Byrne and Bridget Riceci, his wife, were thanked for hosting a wonderful dinner at their home last night. Bill Showers was welcomed and acknowledged for his previous involvement and extensive contributions to the group. Handouts were briefly described: Agenda; Map of tour for tomorrow; Renewal document Participants introduced themselves. Review of minutes. Minutes approved (Rich Hellmich moved; David Byrne 2nd) Other meetings: -(Byrne) NCR-148 tried to meet with WCC-60 this year; didnt come to pass -International meeting in Switzerland details to be provided later. -Pan-Pacific meeting will occur next June (site to be determined); Scott will provide details -NCR-148 organized a symposium for the 2003 annual meeting of the Entomological Society of America; the symposium was well attended. -(Byrne) may want to have a conference on aerobiology at the upcoming International Congress of Entomology in Durban (2008). Committee Reports Nomination: Need a for nomination for Sec./Treas. and someone to replace Gail Kampmeier on the website committee. Letter of thanks should be extended to Gail for her service; she has already received Service Award from the committee. (Further discussion postponed.) Website committee: new website needed because Gail is phasing out. Rufus volunteered to guide transition. Web assistant at MSU left; Rufus completed revised site. Rufus will provide overview and solicit input/feedback. Website hosts renewal reports, annual meeting minutes, state reports (PDF files), and list of publications. These need to be kept current. Where possible, information will be extracted from state reports. Links to other websites need to be updated (generally old). Contact list (and e-mail list) needs to be updated. Rick Hellmich thanked Rufus for work on the site and raised comments about access. Preference not to have secure items on the site. PDF would be fine for reports. Scott Isard offered to provide additional support for the site. Charlie suggested utility of adding links to personal, faculty webpages. Joint meeting: NCR-125 met last week and expressed interest in meeting with NCR-148. Marianne Alleyne from Illinois is the contact. WCC-60 seemed reluctant to hold a joint meeting; efforts to hold a joint meeting with this group were put on hold. General consensus was reached that a meeting with NCR-125 may work well. Awards committee: David B. suggested that we not give an award every year. Rufus suggested need for additional members on this committee (and on NCR-148). Roger Magarey was recommended as a replacement for NC State. A broader discussion was held about the need for funding of research on aerobiology. NRI has dropped aerobiology from the call for proposals in grants programs. Should our committee ask David Hogg to write a letter to NRI (Mary Purcell) to emphasize the importance of migration/dispersal? Elson: Were previous NRI proposals on aerobiology funded? Scott: Proposals are more related to movement now than before. Byrne: NRI should specifically recognize as a priority. Migration/dispersal should be included in call for proposals. NRI-Plant and Animal Biosecurity has funded Isards work. Scott noted that movement and dispersal technical committee did not materialize; forced dispersal research to become more integrated. NRI insect panel has funded leafhopper work. Main: American Phytopath Society has argued that aerobiology is a tween science. Should we approach NRI to include migration in RFP? Group agrees to follow-up with David Hogg; Scott & David will work together to draft a letter once an appropriate group is identified. Administrative Report. Rick Meyer currently at Ohio State (with Casey Hoy) and cannot attend. Dave Hogg will review materials from Rick. Several handouts were discussed: CSREES-Plant Sciences Update FY 2004- 431 awards totaling $88M. Examples: Crops at Risk [31 submitted proposals ($11M); 6 funded ($1.2M)]-Risk Avoidance and Mitigation Program [23 submitted proposals ($30.8M); 3 funded ($3.1M)]-Methyl Bromide Transitions Program [28 submitted proposals ($11.6M); 8 funded ($3.0M)]. The NRI: Animal and Plant Biosecurity program was brought to the attention of the group. For future funding, the federal government is currently running on continuing resolution. Senate may pass omnibus budget in November. Request is for $180M for NRI up from $164M from last year. Rufus mentioned discussion from this morning to request NRI to add language of migration and dispersal. Dave Hogg agreed that Mary Purcell would be the appropriate first contact. Hogg reported that the project renewal for NCR-148 was successful. Mid-project review will be conducted in 2007. Project has been extended to 2009. Report due within 60 days of annual meeting. Scott Isard discussed membership. Dave Hogg is to write letter of invitation. John Westbrook and Scott Isard need letters. Discussion was held about inactive membership and others who should be included. Nominations: Tom Sappington nominated by Rick Hellmich (David Byrne provided second) to serve as Sec. Treasurer. Passed unanimously. Website committee: Rob Venette nominated by Rufus Isaacs (Joe Spencer provided second). Scott Isard nominated by Elson Shields (Charlie Main provided second). Both nominations passed unanimously. Site selection committee: Emphasis to meet with the biocontrol group, NCR-125. Illinois is a likely location. Chicago was recommended as a meeting site. A 2-day meeting was proposed. Meeting will be in October again. Integrative efforts: Interfield models: is this an area for expanded collaboration? (Q raised by C. Main). Scott Isard commented that models are available but are very difficult to parameterize. Dynamics are very difficult to predict. Evaluation of short-term models in quantitative sense seems to be different than probabilistic models that are used in synoptic models. Elson: do we know how to frame the questions? No conclusions reached. Discussion postponed for future meeting. Rick Hellmich will be the new chair; Rob Venette chair elect; Tom Sappington Sec Treas. 4:50 meeting adjourned. October 19, 2005 David Byrne hosted a tour of facilities at the University of Arizona. NCR-148 first met with Colin Kaltenbach, Director of the Agricultural Experiment Station. The group then visited Dr. Tim Dennehey about his research on pink bollworm and management to slow resistance to Bt-cotton. The group briefly visited David Byrnes lab and concluded with a visit to the Tree Ring laboratory.

Intra-field movement of Western Corn Rootworm Beetles in Cornfields: Since the 2001 growing season, intra-field movement of WCR adults has been monitored by detecting ingested transgenic corn tissue in the bodies of WCR collected known distances in adjacent, contiguous plots of non-transgenic corn. From 2001-2003, Monsantos YieldGard® Rootworm hybrid was used as the source of detectable Bt-protein (i.e., Cry3Bb1). In 2004, a YieldGard® hybrid with specificity for Lepidopteran pests (plants express the Bt-protein Cry1Ab) was used as the source of detectable protein. YieldGard® was planted in two of 31 eight-row wide corn plots. At regular intervals, insects were collected from all plots in the four-acre test field and processed to detect the presence of ingested YieldGard® Rootworm plant tissue. The proportion of WCR adults testing positive for the Cry3Bb1 protein expressed in YieldGard® Rootworm corn dropped off quickly at increasing distance from the YieldGard® Rootworm plots. There were no beetle abundance differences between the plots attributable to the varieties. Male and female movement rates were similar for most of the 2001, 2002, 2003, and 2004 growing seasons when the average movement was ca. 7.5, 6.2, 11.2, and 8.3 m/d, and respectively. Male movement appears to be higher during the early season period when the proportion of females in the field is still low. First-flight adult European corn borer (Lepidoptera: Crambidae) distribution in roadside vegetation relative to cropping patterns and corn phenology. The European corn borer, Ostrinia nubilalis (Hübner), is a serious pest of commercial maize throughout the U.S. Corn Belt. Adults in the central and eastern Corn Belt aggregate in grassy areas around and within the cornfield where they spend the daylight hours resting and where mating activity occurs at night. Mated females leave the aggregation sites at night to oviposit in cornfields, thus using the grass as a staging area. Flush samples were taken in borrow ditches in central Iowa during the first (spring) flight of moths in 2003 and 2004 to determine if cropping patterns and crop phenology influence moth distribution across the landscape. Significantly more moths were present in ditches with an adjacent cornfield on at least one side of the road than in those with no corn on either side. In contrast, effects of corn stubble from the previous year's crop, tillage, and corn phenology were weak or not detectable. Evidence suggests that some moths emerging from corn stubble may aggregate in adjacent grass but that they redistribute themselves in the landscape within a short time. Thus, the presence or absence of adjacent corn was the overwhelming factor affecting spatial distribution of first-flight European corn borer moths among grassy roadside ditches. Using genetic markers and population assignment techniques to infer origin of boll weevils (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) unexpectedly captured near an eradication zone in Mexico: Several boll weevils, Anthonomus grandis Boheman, were captured in pheromone traps in 2004 near Tlahualilo, Durango, Mexico, an area where none had been reported for about 10 years. It is possible that they were from an endemic population normally too low in numbers to be detected, but that increased in response to more favorable rainfall conditions in 2004. Alternatively, they may represent an influx of migrants or their immediate descendents. To identify the most likely origin of the boll weevils captured in this area, microsatellite variation was characterized from three other populations sampled in northern Mexico and from one in southern Texas. Both indirect measures of gene flow and individual assignment tests were employed to evaluate interpopulation movement. Analyses suggest that the boll weevils captured near Tlahualilo were primarily from an endemic low-level population, but that this area also is receiving immigrants from a cotton growing region ~200 km to the north, near Rosales, Chihuahua, which is currently under a boll weevil eradication program. Similarly, Rosales is receiving immigrants from Tlahualilo. This study demonstrates that microsatellite markers and population assignment techniques will be practical tools for determining the most likely origins of boll weevils reintroduced to eradication zones in the U.S. and Mexico.