Influence of Imidacloprid seed treatment on ThryvOn cotton

Monday, November 14, 2022

9:00 AM – 9:12 AM PT

Location: Vancouver Convention Centre, Meeting Room 208/209

Presenting Author(s)

WF

Walker B. Farmer

Extension Associate I
Mississippi State University
Starkville, Mississippi

Co-Author(s)

AC

Angus Catchot

Mississippi State University
Mississippi State, Mississippi
JG

Jeffrey Gore

Mississippi State University
Stoneville, Mississippi
WC

Whitney Crow

Mississippi State University
Cleveland, Mississippi
DC

Don Cook

Entomologist
Mississippi State University
Stoneville, Mississippi
BP

Brian Pieralisi

Assistant Professor
Mississippi State University
Starkville, Mississippi

Influence of Imidacloprid Seed Treatment Rate on ThryvOn Cotton

In the Mid-South, thrips are an important early season pest on cotton. Mississippi planted over 500,000 acres of cotton in 2020, all of which were infested with tobacco thrips Frankliniella fusca (Hinds), which resulted in about $6.5 million of economic losses. Therefore, cotton is typically treated with a preventative thrips control product at planting and generally about 25-30% requires an additional foliar treatment to reduce damage from thrips. A new Bacillus thuringiensis trait (ThryvOn^®, Bayer CropScience, St. Louis, MO) has been developed that provides good control of thrips. Currently, there is some debate about the need for an insecticide seed treatment to improve thrips control. We conducted a study to determine if the addition of an imidacloprid seed treatment improves efficacy against tobacco thrips and to determine if reduced rates of seed treatments (100, 75, 50, 25, and 0% of the labeled rate) provide benefits for thrips control in ThryvOn cotton. Preliminary results suggest that a 50% seed treatment rate of imidacloprid provided similar control and yield protection as a 100% imidacloprid seed treatment rate. These preliminary data suggest that ThryvOn cotton could be utilized with a reduced rate of imidacloprid compared to other current commercial varieties, drastically decreasing the number of neonicotinoids released in the environment.

Walker Brett Farmer

Wbf44@msstate.edu

(662)-458-1727