Abundance and diversity of natural enemies related to chrysanthemum aphid suppression with botanical insecticides

Abstract

Abstract The botanical insecticide is one of the strategies to control insect pests in greenhouse pest management programs which effective against pests and selective to natural enemies. A plastic house study was conducted to evaluate the safety of botanical insecticide against natural enemies associated with chrysanthemum aphids. Two series concentration of neem oil insecticides at 3.0 and 3.5% was conducted to investigate the effect of calendar application on the abundance and diversity of natural enemies. The species abundance and diversity of natural enemies were determined by visual assessment, yellow pan trap and sweep net sampling. Based on the research result, there are sixteen species of Aphis gossypii natural enemies from 256 individuals belonging to 12 families under 8 different orders. The most dominant predator was Coccinellidae, Syrphidae and Hemerobiidae families. Coccinellids predator Menochilus sexmaculatus was found to be dominant with the high number of species. Neem oil insecticides did not affect abundance, and composition of natural enemies of chrysanthemum aphids, especially on Coccinellids predator. Therefore, neem oil-based insecticides can be a substantial contribution towards the preservation of biodiversity in plastic house ecosystem.