The United States is galloping ahead with research on fungi that could combat grasshoppers safely and affordably. Similar research has slowed to a crawl in Western Canada due to a lack of funding.
“We started about the same time, but we’ve been left behind,” said Dan Johnson, professor of environmental science at the University of Lethbridge.
“We’re not experiencing a lack of research for non-chemical grasshopper control,” he said. “We’re experiencing a lack of research of any kind on grasshoppers.”
In the U.S., researchers are enthusiastic about naturally occurring microbes that could help counter outbreaks of grasshoppers in pastures and forage crops. One candidate is the fungus Beauveria bassiana, which can get picked up on the grasshopper’s feet after application to a pasture and then destroy the insect by growing quickly inside its body.
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Some limitations have been found with that fungus, so researchers with the U.S. Department of Agriculture are also working with other options, including a fungus called Metarhizium anisopliae var. acridum. It is more virulent than Beaveria and tends to affect only insects of the group Orthoptera, such as grasshoppers and locusts, and not honeybees or beneficial beetles.
“The grasshopper problem has been getting worse in a lot of states,” said Stefan Jaronski, an insect pathologist with the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service.
“We could have a cost effective, environmentally safe alternative to some of the chemicals used now.”
It will still be years before enough information is collected to support registration of Metarhizium anisopliae var. acridum for use on farms in the United States. However, strains of Metarhizium are used to combat grasshoppers and locusts in other parts of the world, including Africa and Australia.
“We want to make sure it will work in North American conditions,” Jaronski said. “Based on Australian and African data, it definitely should work.”
The irony for Johnson is that the work with Metarhizium in Africa was supported with $4 million provided through the Canadian International Development Agency.
Research with Metarhizium began in Canada in the 1990s. Research with Beauveria started earlier than that.
Research showing Metarhizium is effective for grasshopper control in Canada is done, Johnson said, and so is the research showing that it is safe for other creatures such as birds.
But Johnson doubts Metarhizium will be commercially available to Canadian farmers for grasshopper control any time soon.
“Who’s going to benefit? It’s going to benefit the environment and it’s going to benefit a small group of farmers who don’t use chemicals and that’s it.
“There’s no big agency that’s willing to put money into something like that.”
