Hi everyone. I'm going to chime in on this conversation in regards to MET52 (metarhizium anisopliae) and it's effect on our unknown bug (thought to be phylloxera). There's a whole bunch of variables that can account for our success or lack of success, but I really believe the answer is right here in front of us.
I stopped by my professors office (microbiology dept at CSU) and had a quick discussion on what type of experiment could solve this problem. I wrote down the 5 pathogenic organisms that are included in Capulators bennie pack (foliar version that has been effective to this point containing the MET52 metarhizium anisopliae ) and we agreed that the only way to decide which is the effective agent is to perform an experiment where we start with the 5 agents (separately to each plant) then test every combination thereof and use some type of simple visual determination for a loose bug count for each plant and compare.
My professor also explained that these organisms can behave in different ways having to do with the method of reproduction (sexual/asexual). These little things can have quite an effect on our results. Variables, variables, variables...(what else is new in the world of biology?) My first near term goal is to take a bug sample (flier, egg, and crawler) to the agricultural department and have it identified by an entomologist. Next, I will have a discussion with said entomologist to further investigate the insect and determine the best method to shrink down our experiment. I don't know how cooperative they will want to be, but fingers crossed the person will be interested in this dumb bug problem.
I think maybe culture the organisms, add the combinations and individuals to each separate plant and observe the results. I believe that cross contamination will only be an issue for those plants with the ineffective agent and a certain individual or a combination of the correct individuals would produce an effective result. Should I encourage cross contamination to really press the pathogenic organisms?
Also, I'm sampleless for what we believe to be the phylloxera. Anyone in the northern Colorado area can be of great help by providing me with dead samples of crawler and flier as well as some of the eggs. Thanks for your time folks. Please let me know any of your thoughts. This problem has continued for far too long and it is time to truly defeat it.
Lastly, Met52 is something of an inactive preventative. I don't believe it is doing anything until the spore contacts the insects and initiates germination. Temperature matters too, as does the strain (Met52 is strain F52). Here's an abstract from a research article on metarhizium anisopliae and temperature vs. germination rate:
"The germination rates of 122 isolates from 16 Metarhizium anisopliae var. anisopliae strains were determined over a range of temperatures (2·5–37°C). The germination rates and the germination temperature ranges of these strains differed (P > 0·05). Canonical variate analysis highlighted that the cold-active strains (those with isolates that germinated at 5°) were distinctly different from the other strains. The other strains could be separated into two groups, one in which the strains germinated at 37° (heat-active strains) and another in which the strains germinated at neither 5° nor 37° (meso-thermoactive). This study shows that in the development of Metarhizium myco-insecticides the germination rates and ranges of isolates can be matched to environmental temperatures."
S.A. McCammon*, A.C. Rath
Department of Primary Industry and Fisheries, St John's Avenue, New Town, Tasmania 7008, Australia
Our F52 strain is temperature specific. I'll continue looking into that.