ESA Meeting a Sneak Peek of Science That Will Help PMPs in the Future

The Entomology Society of America held its annual academic meeting. Students from undergrad to doctoral candidates, post-docs and professors present results from their experiments. Much of this research has not been published yet and some is still ongoing.

Here are some highlights:

Researchers, including an economist, surveyed hundreds of people in low-income, multifamily housing. All had some previous experience with German cockroaches. They found that the most residents were willing to pay for pest control services was about $18. Around 57 percent sometimes, often, or always saw cockroaches as a child (44 percent rarely or never). Interestingly, almost 50 percent rated being able to choose the pest control company as the least important factor. Their most important factor was getting advanced notice of the service. The second most important fact was having an explanation of the service and why it was performed. They didn’t necessarily care about choosing the date or time of the service. For those doing service at these types of accounts, it may be worth some extra communication with residents and ensuring the site contact notifies the residents ahead of time.

Indian meal moths can be found anywhere from food processing to residential kitchens. We know that the larvae are the stage that is doing all the feeding damage. Finding what they are infesting is key to control. One study looked at different dusts on late instar larvae: the stage that tends to wander away from the food source to pupate. None of the dusts showed significant mortality. It's better to use mating disruption,  IGRs,  and sanitation to control IMM infestations.

Ants kill and collect other insects to feed their developing brood. What if that food source was poisoned? Scientists fed German cockroaches a number of gel baits and then let ants collect the dead cockroaches. Most of the baits caused significant mortality to the ant colonies. Now, this was a lab test and the only food source the ants had was the poisoned cockroaches. This is unlikely to be a practical treatment in the field. However, it shows that ants will readily eat baits with active ingredients especially when other food sources are low.

There has always been the question of whether pesticides and cleaning products contaminate cockroach baits and make them ineffective. They tried Bleach, Fabulous, Lysol, Windex, Demand CS, Alpine, Ortho Home Defense, Raid, and more. Researchers sprayed these over the cockroach bait. It had absolutely no effect on bait consumption or mortality compared to the control. The only product that had an effect was DEET which was highly repellent. We don’t want customers to use cleaning products and clean up after we have baited. However, as long as the bait stays, the cockroaches will still eat it.

There were numerous group and committee meetings such as the Women in Entomology Breakfast.

A symposium was put on to showcase the jobs in urban entomology. Professionals not associated with universities or government research were invited to speak. The symposium was primarily designed for students and early career professionals. Presenters shared their stories of how they got into this industry (it’s a messy journey for most of us) and what they do now.

Speakers were Dusana Bondy (Abell Pest Control), Sally Abbar (Envu) Christie McCoy (Torigen), Kim Kelly Tunis (Nisus), Tori Pocius (Trece), Nancy Troyano (Rentokill/Terminix), and NPMA’s Dominique Stumph. We are always trying to show how awesome the pest control industry is and get more people involved.

A shoutout to Rockwell Labs, Central Life Sciences, Syngenta, BASF, Rentokill/Terminix, and SC Johnson for donating money to the Urban section of ESA. This allows the section to recruit more people and showcase our industry better. It also provides scholarships for travel and research grants. The more research we have on our urban pests, the better we can manage them.

Finally, Kurt Treftz of Cascade Pest Control was recognized with the ACE Professional Award. This award recognizes the superior contributions of an Associate Certified Entomologist in the field of structural pest management.

This scientific meeting is especially important for the pest control industry. Some of this research is brand new and hasn’t been published yet and some isn’t finalized. We get an early look at the science that helps pest control professionals do their jobs better, creating happier customers.