3 February 1995 ENZA Fellowship Could Spell Doom For Mischievous Midge

A well-established but little understood pest of apple trees in New Zealand – the apple leafcurling midge – will come under the research spotlight at Lincoln University through the award of a prestigious fellowship to B.Hort.Sc.(Hons) graduate Jason Smith.

Jason, from Nelson, has been awarded the ENZA New Zealand (International) Don Sinclair Research Fellowship which exists to encourage postgraduate study in New Zealand which will contribute to the pipfruit industry. In Jason's case the research will be towards a Ph.D through the Department of Entomology and Animal Ecology.

The apple leafcurling midge (Dasyneura mali) is now a common apple tree pest in New Zealand, having been introduced, it is thought, on apple stocks from the Netherlands. In the past ALM was regarded as a secondary problem mainly controlled by insecticides applied against key pests such as leafrollers and codling moth. Recently, however, there has been a sudden increase in the midges, a matter of major concern to the NZ Apple and Pear Marketing Board due to the potential impact on export produce and associated quarantine regulations.

Applied entomologists generally recognize that a sound knowledge of pest phenology and population dynamics is fundamental to the development of long-term management programmes. This is where Jason's work comes in because there is little information of this type relating to New Zealand ALM populations.

The main aim of his work is to investigate the ecology and phenology of ALM so that armed with such knowledge orchardists should be able to determine the most effective time for insecticide applications, and also be able to manipulate the scheduling of such applications to obtain the greatest benefit from ALMs' natural predators and parasites.

All in all it should be possible to reduce the impact of apple leafcurling midge on export produce and associated quarantine restrictions.

Jason's Ph.D supervisor, Bruce Chapman, says the project typifies the applied nature of so much of the research at Lincoln.

"Here we have a project which will be of direct benefit to a significant New Zealand industry and, through that industry's role in export earnings it will have benefits for the country as a whole. The research has implications for all New Zealanders," he says.

Ian Collins, Journalist, Lincoln University, Canterbury, New Zealand.