Insects as food. The red palm weevil is destroying palm trees in Europe like locust crops. Sochi is next. Folk methods of dealing with weevil
The invasion of the marble bug became a real natural disaster for Abkhazia. For the third year now, these pests have been destroying a significant part of the harvest of many strategic crops for the country. and here are the new misfortunes. The palm weevil attacked the Abkhazian palm trees. Ecologists found 7 palm trees affected by the pest. All of them will have to be eliminated and burned to avoid further spread of the insect. It is no longer possible to save such trees. The presence of a pest often becomes noticeable only on a dying plant.
The palm weevil is a beetle with a body length of 20-50 mm. The body of the beetles is oblong, somewhat flattened from above, red-brown, brown or black in color. The original range is the tropical regions of Southeast Asia (Vietnam, New Guinea, Indonesia, Cambodia and others), the islands of Polynesia, for Rhynchophorus phoenicis- tropical and equatorial Africa: from Senegal to Ethiopia and South Africa. The worst thing is that these creatures destroy trees from the inside. They especially love rotting trees. Unfortunately, Abkhazia does not have enough funds for proper tree care, and all the weak ones are at risk.
The main signs by which palm weevil damage can be identified
- drying out of the central rosette in the palm tree, changing the color of the leaves;
- lowering of leaves, the crown of a palm tree has a roof-like appearance;
- the presence of flight holes in the trunks of palms up to 3 cm in diameter;
- breaking off the trunks of palm trees;
- detection inside the trunks of larvae, cocoons, pest beetles.
How to defeat the palm weevil
Administrative: limiting the import of planting material for palm trees from European nurseries and careful phytosanitary control of newly imported plants.
Mechanical: collection and destruction of all stages of the pest (burning). Destruction of the affected plant.
Of the chemicals during the growing season from March to December at an air temperature above +17 0 С, it is necessary to treat palm trees with insecticides based on imidacloprid (confidor, golden spark, commander) at the rate of 40 ml per 10 liters of water or based on chlorpyrifos (dursban, sairen ) at the rate of 80 ml per 10 liters of water. Processing is carried out at the rate of 10 liters of working fluid per plant.
Palm trees are an integral element of the garden-pack landscapes of Abkhazian cities. Nevertheless, the palm weevil can settle and lead to the death of not only the Canarian date, but also other types of palms: bud (Chinese fan palm), chamerops (European fan palm), Washingtonia, butia, yubei, sabal and others.
“So far, 7 palm trees have been found that are subject to destruction. These trees can no longer be saved, they are irreversibly damaged by the pest and they must be urgently removed by destroying the insect. We held a meeting with environmentalists, this is a very serious issue, we must save our palm trees,” said Elena Atepina, Deputy Head of the Communal Administration. According to her, in the coming days, a list will be drawn up listing palm trees that are subject to treatment. “Treatment should not be one-time, it is necessary to carry out continuous treatments, since weevil larvae hide in the depths of the trunk and are very difficult to detect. Treatment should be carried out by specialists, since this work is with pesticides. All these issues will be decided at the government level. At present, our task is to eliminate these 7 palms. Representatives of the State Committee for Ecology are present here, they have set traps so that the insect does not move to neighboring palm trees,” Atepina explained. In general, while the killers of palm trees are winning in Abkhazia.
The palm weevil is an extremely dangerous pest, which is a real challenge to the relevant state services of Abkhazia.
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In September 2014, on the territory of Sochi, on the Canarian date, imported in 2013 from Italy, red palm weevil Rhynchophorus ferrugineus Olive . (Coleoptera: Curculionidae) is a dangerous quarantine phytophage that is a pest of palm trees (according to the literature data, both sugar cane and bananas, and in this regard, it is a dangerous agricultural pest in the countries cultivating these crops).
natural range- tropical regions of Southeast Asia: the islands of Polynesia, Vietnam, New Guinea, Indonesia, Cambodia, etc.
In the 1980-90s. the species has penetrated the Middle East and northern Africa. In connection with the construction boom and active landscaping in 2005. Rhynchophorusferrugineus was brought to Spain, Italy, French Corsica, Cyprus, noted in Israel, and in 2009-2010. was found in Mexico, USA and Japan - about. Curacao. Since 2007, the European Union has adopted restriction on the import of palm trees in view of the invasion of this phytophage with introduced plant material.
The invasion of this phytophage is exclusively anthropogenic.- as a result of the export of planting material, vegetable fruit products. It must be said that the Rhynchophorus ferrugineus in view of morphological features and evolutionary genetic factors, it has a weak flying ability, can settle in a radius not exceeding 5 km, and leads a hidden lifestyle. It is also necessary to note the fact that diapause in the imago phase is characteristic of the species.
The main signs by which damage by the red palm weevil can be determined are:
Drying of the central rosette in the palm tree, discoloration of the leaves;
Lowering of the leaves, the crown of the palm tree has a roof-like appearance;
The presence of flight holes in the trunks of palm trees up to 3 cm in diameter;
Breaking the trunks of palm trees;
Detection inside the trunks of larvae, cocoons, pest beetles.
Bug red palm weevil - one of the largest representatives of the family - body length 35-50 mm. The body of the beetles is oblong, slightly flattened from above, the elytra are hard, from light ocher to rusty-brown in color with dark spots on the back. Sexual dimorphism is poorly developed: females are somewhat larger than males, with a longer rostrum and more convex elytra, while males have a longitudinal “mane” of rufous hairs on the upper side of the rostrum. The head of weevils is elongated into a rostrum, the main purpose of which is to gnaw through a channel in plants and wood to feed and push the laid eggs into this channel.
Larva of the red palm weevil is large up to 5 cm, legless, C-shaped, whitish-cream in color with a brown head, consisting of a head shield with powerful gnawing mandibles. An interesting fact: large fleshy larvae of palm weevils are eaten by the local population of Africa and Southeast Asia.
Cocoon up to 5 cm long, made of palm fibers, brown in color, usually found in petioles of palm leaves. Weevil pupae resemble beetles in shape, with weakly expressed rudiments of wings, legs, and rostrum.
Red palm weevil Rhynchophorus ferrugineus refers to monovoltine species, that is, it has one generation per year. Life cycle monovoltine insects, as a rule, coincides with the annual cycle of development of host plants, however, diapausing individuals can increase the duration to two years or more. The egg phase lasts up to 7 days, larvae - 3-4 months, pupae 14-21 days. One female lays an average of 150-180 eggs (maximum - 350) on the top of the palms as close as possible to the point of growth. ( It should be remembered that the growing point of the palm tree is approximately 50 cm below the visible point of the end of the trunk !!! ) The hatched larvae penetrate inside the trunk and feed on plant tissues there, almost completely destroying the core and destroying the growing point of the palm tree. Damage is almost invisible until the palm tree dies.
Measures to control the red palm weevil:
Administrative: restriction of the import of planting material of palm trees from European nurseries and careful phytosanitary control of newly imported plants.
Mechanical: collection and destruction of all stages of the pest (burning). Destruction of the affected plant.
From chemicals during the growing season from March to December at an air temperature above +17 0 С, it is necessary to treat palm trees with insecticides based on imidacloprid (confidor, golden spark, commander) at the rate of 40 ml per 10 l of water or based on chlorpyrifos (dursban, sairen) at the rate of 80 ml per 10 liters of water. Processing is carried out at the rate of 10 liters of working fluid per plant.
Palm trees are an integral element of the garden landscapes of the city of Sochi. Currently, the red palm weevil is found only in a few places, on palms imported from nurseries in southern Italy. No weevil was found on old palm trees growing in the parks of Sochi.
However, the pest can settle and lead to the death of not only the Canarian date, but also other types of palms: bud (Chinese fan palm), chamerops (European fan palm), Washingtonia, Butia, Yubei, Sabal and others.
Karpun Natalya Nikolaevna - Deputy. Director for Science, Ph.D. biol. sciences, associate professor.
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As you know, in addition to Sochi with foreign planting material, another dangerous insect pest was brought in - the red palm weevil.
homeland of the red palm weevil ( Rhynchophorus ferrugineus) is Southeast Asia and Polynesia. The size of an adult insect is 2.5 cm. The elongated rostrum is clearly visible in the weevil, thanks to which it got its name. The insect has a rusty-red color with dark spots. The life expectancy of a beetle does not exceed four months. For all the time of her life, the female lays 350 eggs. At the same time, she can lay eggs 3-4 times during the season. The insect feeds on the core of palm trees, so the process of infection of the plant goes unnoticed. The weevil leaves the palm tree and goes in search of a new victim when she is already dying.
Europe, as in the case of the moth, faced this dangerous pest much earlier. The palm weevil was first introduced to Catalonia in 2005. Thanks to the mild climate, the insect successfully naturalized. In the first few years after the unintentional introduction, Catalonia was left without three thousand palm trees.
This pest has contributed to many fears about the fate of the Canarian date palm in Spain, Portugal and France. So on the pages of the Catalan edition of El Periodico, fears are expressed that because of this pest, the Canarian date may completely disappear from the Western Mediterranean. Therefore, the European Union introduced strict restrictions on the import of palm trees from other countries.
In Mexico, the main victim of this pest is the date finger (fruit, which can be bought in stores). The Mexican agricultural industry began to suffer huge losses. The government of this Central American country declared war on this pest, and after several years of struggle, the "epidemic" was stopped, but unfortunately not for long. Soon a new batch of weevil arrived again in Mexico with imported planting material.
In Sochi, this pest was also introduced. Our "gouging" can lead to the city's palm trees suffering the same fate as boxwood, which is fatal for a resort city, since evergreen boxwood and palm trees increase the recreational potential of Sochi. There is no doubt that the disappearance of boxwood from the Sochi coast to a certain extent (so far no one has counted) has affected the tourist flow and income of the resort, since many recreational facilities without boxwood look dull in winter.
Employees of the Research Institute of Floriculture and Subtropical Crops have repeatedly found this pest in the palm trees of the city, i.e. this pest has been conducting its “sabotage work” on the streets of the resort for a long time and I would not like to know about this problem when all the palm trees have already died, as it happened with boxwood.
About a month ago, attentive employees of the Arboretum saw in time a dying infected Canary date palm in the circus area (literally tens of meters from the Arboretum park). The palm tree, after obtaining permission, was cut down, a whole hotbed of this "infection" was found in the tree. From the hollow trunk of a palm tree, literally, there was “steam” (“larvae” of the weevil heated the air to such an extent).
The other day, the Research Institute of Floriculture and Subtropical Crops presented its own. By the way, the most original struggle with the palm weevil is in the United Arab Emirates. There they were able to train dogs that accurately identify infected palm trees by sniffing out the waste products of larvae and adults of weevils.
Feeding humanity is becoming increasingly difficult. We may soon have no choice but to start eating insects. A couple of years ago, experts already spoke at the UN with a report in support of this initiative. A massive transition to a new diet will improve not only the environment, but also people's health, because insects are an excellent source of healthy proteins. Look At Me invites you to get acquainted with those bugs and worms that may soon be on our plates.
Grasshopper Baking
In 2013, a group of students from McGill University (Montreal) received the prestigious Hult Award and $1 million for developing grasshopper meal to help fight hunger. Participants in the competition had to organize "a social enterprise capable of providing food to undernourished communities, in particular, 200 million people living in urban slums." As a result, the students came up with nothing better than to breed grasshoppers in poor areas of Mexico, Thailand and Kenya, which will later turn into flour for baking and other products. According to the proposed technology, insects must first be dried and then frozen in sealed bags, then washed, dried again and ground into powder. As a result, the new power source will not only be available all year round, but will also be inexpensive. The pledged capital of $1 million will help them launch this program.
Peacock-eye larvae
Dried caterpillars of the moth Gonimbrasia belina have always been an important source of protein for South Africans. The gathering of these caterpillars is a common economic activity of Africans, and in the future, probably ours. Today, dried, smoked or pickled caterpillars are sold in supermarkets and markets, and cost four times more than traditional meat. To prepare the caterpillars for consumption, they are first cleaned of their entrails, either by simply squeezing them in their hands or cutting them lengthwise. After that, they are eaten raw or boiled in salted water and dried in the sun. They do not have a particularly bright taste and, according to those who have tried them, they look like dried tofu or tea leaves. Therefore, they are often served with fried onions or used in the preparation of soups, sauces and cereals.
silkworm larvae
What Australians call witchetti larvae are known among entomologists as gypsy moth larvae. They have always been a traditional food of the local Aboriginal people, who roasted them in coals or over an open fire. When cooked, the taste of the larvae resembles nuts with the taste of scrambled eggs and soft mozzarella cheese, wrapped in puff pastry. But the gourmets most accustomed to eating grubs eat them alive.
In Asia, silkworm larvae are also popular, only another - mulberry. Caterpillars, which feed exclusively on mulberry leaves, are considered a delicacy in Vietnam and China, they are endowed with a lot of useful properties. Insects feature prominently in Korean cuisine and are used in the popular dish ppondegi, which consists of larvae boiled in steam or in spiced oil. In Japan, silkworm larvae are served in the form of tsukudani, that is, boiled with seaweed in a marinade of soy sauce, sake, mirin and sugar. In the Indian state of Assam, boiled pupae are eaten with salt or fried with chili peppers and herbs and eaten as a snack.
The silkworm has even been suggested as a possible alternative to the traditional diet of astronauts. Chinese researchers have said that insects can be a real lifesaver during long space travel, designed for several years. Miniature ecosystems in which larvae will grow and develop can become an almost inexhaustible source of animal protein.
Ants
Ants are distributed throughout the planet - from the Arctic to the tropics. They are dried in the sun, smoked, steamed. For example, in poor rural areas of Thailand, spicy rice with carpenter ants fried in oil is often cooked. Ants are very popular in Colombia, where local farmers sell them live and cooked on stalls for about $6 per kilo. In Cambodia and Laos, red wood ants are widely eaten, which are sold at local markets even cheaper - about $ 1 per 1 kg.
Indians living in the Amazon prefer to eat winged females. They are caught with baskets when they fly out of their nests in huge swarms, and their fried bellies are said to taste like fried bacon. Australian natives eat honey ants, which live underground at a depth of up to 2 m, but have a sweet taste. In Mexico, escamoles ant pupae are considered a delicacy and can be found on menus in city restaurants. They are usually served fried without any additions or boiled with garlic and onions.
termites
termites (they are not relatives of ants, although they look like them) widespread in African countries, especially in those adjacent to the Sahara Desert. All representatives of the colony go to food, including eggs and females, the largest of which can reach the size of a potato tuber. Termites are also used to make a kind of butter. To do this, they are boiled and the surfaced fat is collected from the surface, after which it is used to prepare other dishes.
palm weevil
Red palm weevil larvae have long been a part of traditional Southeast Asian cuisine, where they are deep-fried for several minutes and served with salt and a dash of white pepper. These larvae are also consumed raw - so they have a creamy taste, boiled - meaty, close to bacon. They are often cooked in palm flour. In New Guinea, they are roasted on a spit on special holidays.
The palm weevil is a rather large insect, and some individuals reach 8 cm in length. These insects are malicious pests that gnaw holes in the trunks of palm trees and kill plants.
"stink bugs"
tree bugs (or in the common people stink bugs) in many countries in South Africa they are eaten as a snack, but before that they are soaked in warm water to get rid of an unnecessarily harsh aroma. In South America (where they eat a local variety of stink bugs) they, on the contrary, are valued for their aroma, so they are added to food as a seasoning: they make sauces, fry and add to tacos and pates. The stink bugs are also valued for their strong smell in Vietnam, where they are used to make spicy roasts, and in Laos, where these insects are ground with spices and herbs into a paste called chio.
flour worms
beetle larvae (or flour beetle)- one of the few insects that are consumed in the Western world, for example, in the Netherlands. The nutritional value of mealworms can hardly be overestimated, in addition, they are rich in copper, sodium, potassium, iron, zinc and selenium. The Dutch scientist Arnold van Huys, one of the main popularizers of the mealworm diet, together with the local school of cooks even published a whole cookbook with recipes for dishes from these insects: you can find rolls, baskets and other dishes from larvae in it.
Everyone can now grow the food of the future. The project, developed by Tiny Farms, allows you to create a personal farm with everything you need to start growing edible beetle larvae at home. The set consists of two main containers, a mounting frame, a selection kit and an incubator. The company offers to either purchase a ready-to-work farm, or make it yourself according to the drawings that are posted in the public domain.
We have no choice but to tell you what to do with it. SCAPP continues to escalate the ecological situation in Sochi and talk about pests that can leave the resort bare mountains, deserted streets and the Arboretum without palms and boxwood.
Story
It was 2012, the city of Sochi was being built, polished, washed, taught English - in a word, was preparing for the Olympic Games. Thinking about how to plant greenery in the Olympic village in Imeretinka, it was decided to turn their eyes to Italy and búxus sempervírens, in the common people - evergreen boxwood. A little later, the first parcel arrived from Italy: several thousand planting material. Everyone exhaled happily - “one less problem”, and switched to other pre-Olympic concerns. In the meantime, September 2012 came, when the employees of the nursery for the temporary maintenance of planting material noticed some caterpillars willingly eating the leaves of the imported boxwood. This was the beginning of the adventures of the boxwood moth in Sochi.
Having received no opposition in the nursery, the fire moth began to spread with surprising speed across the Krasnodar Territory. Already in 2013, the moth was discovered in Krasnodar, Novorossiysk, Gelendzhik and the natural monuments of Sochi: the Sochi National Park and the Caucasian Biosphere Reserve became infected. No one could adequately answer the pests: ordinary chemistry did not work on insects, the mechanical method of destruction is ineffective, plus the caterpillars have no natural enemies, since no one wants to touch them because of the poisonous alkaloids. Add to that the priority for the Olympics and the seemingly insignificance of the problem then - the perfect recipe for breeding.
In 2014, the moth began to eat up Krasnodar, Abkhazia, the cities of the Black Sea coast, and the Arboretum. When the scale of the feast of caterpillars began to stagger the imagination, the government and city administrations woke up, openly declaring that the problem exists, that it is being solved - in general, wait, we will come up with something. While we were waiting, Sochi continued to import a variety of planting material: palm trees, boxwood, eucalyptus and other exotic species. For landscaping, of course. Tourists arrived from Italy along with palm trees. No, but the red palm weevil, eucalyptus chalcida, palm moth, ophelimus maskela, eucalyptus psilida, acisia, eucalyptus psyllid, Ohrid miner - only about 20 pests new to our area that are #right now gnawing another palm tree / boxwood / eucalyptus / chestnut /maple/mimosa or your favorite vineyard.
Chemistry poison!
According to Vladimir Ostapuk, chairman of the Ecological Council of Sochi, there is no service for checking imported plants in Sochi, so every new tree from abroad is a game of Russian roulette. But now it's not the most important thing. What to do with those who have already been brought? That's right - destroy. How? Chemically poison them! Yes, great solution. So did the city administration within the city center. The boxwood was sprayed - the boxwood was saved. But on the territory of the Sochi National Park (Arboretum) and the Caucasian Biosphere Reserve (Yew-Boxwood Grove), this is not done because of the laws of the Russian Federation, which prohibit the use of chemicals within protected areas. Accordingly, urban boxwoods are saved for the time being, as hungry caterpillars will again and again look for new sources of food. But focusing on the moth problem, we are doing the same as the Ministry of Natural Resources did in 2012: we do not notice even more dangerous pests.
The red palm weevil and the palm moth do not like boxwood, they prefer palm trees. Yes, palm trees, idolized by tourists and distinguishing Sochi from other Black Sea resorts in Russia. In order to understand the danger of the weevil beetle, we find out how it develops. The female beetle lays 200-300 eggs on top of a palm tree. A week later, hungry larvae appear that make their way inside the trunk and begin to eat the core of the palm tree, thereby destroying its growth point. While the larvae eat the palm from the inside, everything is unchanged from the outside: the tree blooms and smells. And after about 6-12 months, the palm tree falls off sharply, dries up and dies. At the same time, it is very difficult to determine the presence of pests in a seemingly healthy palm tree: you need a stethoscope or a specially trained dog. Dogs need to be discharged from Spain, and no one wants to mess with a stethoscope, so weevils actively populate new territories: there are already infected palm trees in the Imeretinskaya lowland, Adler and Khostinsky districts of the city.
What to do?
Even the Ministry of Nature does not have an unequivocal answer. While they only offer, discuss and consider. They propose to launch Chinese wasps, which feed on moth under laboratory conditions, ask the Prosecutor General's Office and are considering the proposal to introduce an emergency regime, and thereby approve the use of chemicals in the reserves. It seems that the bureaucratic machine has begun to spin, only the boxwood and palm trees do not get better from this. Only 10% of the Sochi boxwood remained, the natural monument Yew-boxwood grove died out, palm trees and eucalyptus are in the high-risk zone, the starving moth began to feed on maple, ash, blackberry and other plant species, the Chinese wasp, after a possible victory over the boxwood moth, may become a new pest of the city, and chemicals can harm the flora and fauna of the reserves - the urban landscape and natural attractions of the city are in a pre-apocalyptic state. And no one has a single right answer. But we know for sure that this year we will still be able to admire our exotics and palm trees, but perhaps for the last time in our lives. We do not exaggerate, but simply cite the opinion of environmentalists who say that this year will be decisive for the nature of Sochi: "Either we them, or they us."
