Mohamed:

Do you have pictures of insects malformed by insect growth regulator insecticides?

Inu:

what is most effective as a biological control, predator or parasitoid, why?

I personally don’t have any pictures of malformed insects due to an insect growth regulator. Sorry. But honestly, I don’t know how ‘malformed’ the insect would be. The way the growth regulator insecticides work is by preventing the insect from reaching adulthood. Some of the most common insect growth regulators are methoprene and lufeneron which are used for treating mosquitoes and fleas, respectively. Methoprene is a hormonal analogue of juvenile hormone (JH). It prevents the insect from molting into an adult and the larva/pupa eventually dies. Methoprene is used in water storage tanks to control mosquitoes. Lufeneron, which is a tablet you feed to your pet to control fleas is a chitinase inhibitor. Flea larvae have a chitin tooth that they use to break out of the egg and the chitinase inhibitor causes the tooth to fail to develop. So, the larva cannot hatch from the egg and dies.

What is more effective as a biological control, predators or parasitoids? Gosh, good question but I think the answer would vary depending on the person you ask and which predators/parasitoids you had in mind because there are pros and cons to each. Natural enemies (predators, parasitoids, pathogens) are biological control agents. There are several factors that render a biocontrol agent as effective and include things like (a) narrow host ranges, (b) habitat adaptability, (c) synchrony with the host life cycle, and (d) high reproductive potential. In my opinion, I would argue that parasitoids fit some of these factors more readily than predators would. And most predators tend to be generalists and would also effect non-target groups. But again, depends on who you ask.

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