Selection of attractive food sources and toxicity of insecticides in tomato fruit borer management

Abstract

This work aimed at evaluating the food preference, the threshold of food intake and the toxic effect of insecticides associated with attractive food sources on adults of Neoleucinodes elegantalis. The following attractive food sources were tested: molasses and honey at 10%, hexanic extract of green tomato fruits at 0.4%, sucrose at 5%, orange and grape juice at 30%, red wine vinegar at 10%, and hydrolyzed protein at 5% concentration. Based on the food preference test, sucrose, molasses, honey, and orange juice were selected to determine the threshold concentration capable of stimulating feeding in N. elegantalis adults. The toxic effect of insecticides added to honey at 10% was also tested. Sucrose and honey had the best results in terms of number of landings, landing time, and feeding time of adults of N. elegantalis. The insecticides did not affect negatively the attraction of N. elegantalis adults to the food sources. Carbaryl, cartap, deltamethrin, fenpropatrin, indoxacarb, lambda-cyhalothrin, and lufenuron caused 100% mortality of adults (males and females), after 24 hours of exposure, which suggests that they are promising for use in toxic baits.