A simple and low cost injection technique to protect efficiently ornamental Phoenix against the red palm weevil during one year

Abstract

Gomez, S. and M. Ferry. 2019. A simple and low cost injection technique to protect efficiently ornamental Phoenix against the red palm weevil during one year. Arab Journal of Plant Protection, 37(2): 124-129. Preventive injection treatments in the framework of IPM programs to control the RPW in ornamental palms can present the great advantage to protect them for a long period, but also to transform them in deadly traps for the new weevil generations, contributing thus greatly to the decline of the RPW population. But for the preventive treatments as well as for the other components of the RPW control programmes, it is now essential, given the widespread and abundance of the pest, to propose simple to apply and low cost but also efficient and safe technologies. In this study, a very simple technique was developed based on an infusion process to inject an emamectin benzoate (EMA) formulation, at 3,5% concentration. The results showed excellent efficiency under different experimental conditions. For the palms of more than 8 meters height, 100% of the larvae were killed even 360 days after injection, compared to 11% in the control treatment.