Strategy and Tactics of Insect Control

Abstract

The background against which decisions on control strategy and tactics are made is explained and general approaches to pest control are discussed at length. Canadian work on population dynamics that involves research on the processes that regulate numbers is reviewed. The author's conviction that this work provides the best avenue yet explored to the solution rather than temporary alleviation of pest problems is explained. A pest-control strategy for the insects attacking peach in the Niagara Peninsula, in which a logical progression of research, the assignment of priorities, and the concentration of staff and facilities on problems of major importance are advocated, is outlined. Finally, weaknesses in administrative strategy are discussed and it is suggested that the findings of basic researchers on population dynamics should be exploited more fully by parent organizations and applied more energetically by those directly charged with responsibility for insect control.