Talk:Biological pest control

message: This article leads off with issues/problems with Biological pest control.
It should start with more of a useful description of the topic for people who want to know about the subject before the soapbox is mounted.
Yes there are problems however the use of biological controls is generally more environmentally concious than chemical control methods.
198.103.184.76 (talk)strider22  —Preceding undated comment added 21:10, 29 February 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  wrong order - balance 

message: Most of this article (including pictures, formatting and references) is directly lifted from an Answers.com article on the subject.  Answers.com article
Dr. Root 19:49, 11 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Plagiarism

message: What about the adverse effects of introducing species/ diseases as biological control? I think a section on this would be useful.
—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 70.250.154.228 (talk) 18:52, 6 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. Could be expanded though. Hope this helps. Bugguyak (talk) 12:37, 8 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: adverse effects?

message: Biological control is used and studied in a much wider context than organic gardening.  For example, it has become the standard method of pest control on several commercial greenhouse crops such as tomatoes.  It is also the subject of a large body of research work in applied entomology.  As someone who works and has done research in this field, I found it odd that the introduction to this article is actually about organic gardening.  It seems to me that the introduction should be about biological control in general, and its use in organic (or non-organic gardening for that matter) should be given as an example.
:I agree that this article needs to be expanded in order to be accurate. There is no mention of the types of biocontrol, such as conservation, augmentation, and classical biological control.--Bugguyak 17:43, 13 May 2007 (UTC
::What stood out to me, was the small amount of information on the use of biological control to control invasive species by introducing a predator from the invasive species' original environment.  I don't know much about the subject, but UC riverside has a wealth of information on it. http://www.biocontrol.ucr.edu/index.html 71.84.247.116 (talk) 05:34, 14 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  expand context for this subject 

message: There is one mention of the fungus Trichoderma on the page.  Should also be linked to Entomopathogenic fungi, Beauveria bassiana, Bacillus thuringiensis (Bt), and others. Nemetona 18:02, 26 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Microbial biocontrol section needed

message: It may also be useful to have some background information on the history of and development of biological control. This will help establish the scientific basis of this field. Some mention should be made of Paul DeBach's work and his colleague's and students.  He was very influential in developing the field based on good scientific and technological foundations.  For a brief summary of his work see  Paul DeBach Trebot 17:13, 23 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: History and development of biological control section needed

message: I do not believe that this section is well tied to the topic of biological control. Initial bullets are good, but the list of pest-repellant and deterrant plants goes beyond the topic. The effectiveness of this approach is highly questionable and methods are poorly documented. I would like to remove the table from this section and focus on the use of plants to provide food and habitat for beneficial organisms. Any other thoughts? --botanybob 21:47, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Good job. I support this. Bugguyak 23:16, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Plants section comments

message: I think there is a mistake on references. The article of Collier et al. 2003 is more an article of  
T. Collier et R. Van Steenwyk -2004- A critical evaluation of augmentative biological control. Biological Control (31): 245-256  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 207.134.169.113 (talk) 14:44, 7 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  reference 

message: Please include :
* Phytoseiulus persimilis (against spider mites)
* Amblyseius californicus (against spider mites)
* Amblyseius cucumeris (against spider mites) Spider mites and their natural enemies
* Typhlodromips swirskii (aginst spider mites, thrips, and white fly)
* Feltiella acarisuga (against spider mites)
* Stethorus punctillum (against spider mites)
* Macrolophus caluginosus (against spider mites)
* Encarsia formosa (against white fly) 
* Eretmocerus spp. (against white fly)White flies and their natural enemies
as natural predators and
* Paecilomyces fumosoroseus (known by the trade name PreFeRal) against white fly
as a mould
* Metarhizium anisopliae; this mould is used in the battle against the north african locusts with much success (under the LUBILOSA-project)
into the article. perhaps it is already best to put on seperate page.
Thanks.
KVDP (talk) 14:27, 10 March 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Extra predators and moulds to include 

message: I am looking for some reviews for the article rabbit haemorrhagic disease. Thank you!  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Lisakauth (talk • contribs) 17:22, 6 April 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks good! Thanks for putting in some hard work. By the way, you can sign with four tildes. OptimistBen (talk) 20:59, 10 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Rabbit Haemorrhagic Disease 

message: Copper oxide chloride also seems to be used frequenly as a (semi?)-biological pest control agent. Please include
:Biological control is typically defined as the control of pest populations by use of living organisms or viruses. A chemical treatment wouldn't fall under the category of biological control since there isn't an organism involved. Kingofaces42 (talk) 01:38, 29 March 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Copper oxide chloride

message: Information from following booklet may be translated by google translate and included:
http://www.west-vlaanderen.be/upload/povlt/site-2007/PDF/publicaties/vijand/VGW-2007.pdf  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.66.60.196 (talk) 14:47, 16 September 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Booklet

message: Octopamine is considered an exciting target for new insecticides primarily because for many years it was thought to be absent in vertebrates. This leads most researchers to jump to the conclusion that it is not effective in vertebrates. However, this does not necessarily have to be the case. 
Several review papers discuss octopamine's watershed dichotomy between vertebrates and invertebrates. 
Octopamine in invertebrates and vertebrates. A review.
JC David, JF Coulon - Prog Neurobiol, 1985 - ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Prog Neurobiol. 1985;24(2):141-85
TYRAMINE AND OCTOPAMINE: Ruling Behavior and Metabolism
T Roeder - Annual Review of Entomology, 2005 - Annual Reviews
The possible role of octopamine as a synaptic transmitter: a review.
TP Hicks - Can J Physiol Pharmacol, 1977 - ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
But whatever the findings, the dichotomy remains due to size differences between terrestrial vertebrates and invertebrates.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.173.216.69 (talk) 06:47, 13 March 2010 (UTC)
thread_title: Octopamine physiological effect in humans

message: Here's an example, wasps used in Thailand to protect agriculture:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/19/world/asia/19thai.html
Dhollm (talk) 19:01, 18 July 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Example 

message: as off-shoots from the Conservation section; here are following useful extra article; they can perhaps be added in the see also or external links section:
* https://en.wikibooks.org/w/index.php?title=Beekeeping/Plants_for_Honey_Bees
* https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Beekeeping/Plants_for_Bumblebees
* https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Plants_for_birds_%28food%29
* https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Plants_for_butterflies_%28food%29
*Insectary_plants
KVDP (talk) 14:53, 20 December 2013 (UTC)
thread_title: Links

message: The article is receiving additions from several students at the moment. These are individually quite well organised and cited, but there are obvious questions of balance and lack of top-level planning – among other things, the changes are not being reflected in the lead, and placement seems to be random from the point of view of the subject as a whole. While I sympathize with the general idea of making Wikipedia an educational tool, the lack of co-ordination at article level is an issue. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:30, 11 November 2017 (UTC)
thread_title: Additions

message: Article on Earwig does not talk about it being a beneficial enemy of a pest. It is mostly referred to as a pest. 
Article on Biological Pest Control mentions it as a predator that should be encouraged in gardens by hanging a upside down flower pot full of straw or wood dust. Both are marked good articles.Uralunlucayakli (talk) 18:38, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: I am afraid you will find such inconsistencies all over the place on Wikipedia. Sources do not always agree and editors have different views as to what to include and what to omit. You can make alterations yourself as long as they are backed by reliable sources. Cwmhiraeth (talk) 20:08, 24 July 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Earwig (Dermaptera) 

message: There are definitional problems to this article. The first sentence that enumerates certain species that are used by humans for biological pest control seems arbitrary. Why are, for example, no cats included that were domesticated by humans very early on against mice? Gun Powder Ma (talk) 14:59, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
replies: text: Rodents would be a pest, so there's nothing wrong with the definition. Not all examples are going to be given. Some biocontrol literature does talk about cats, but they tend to focus on more "modern" historical examples where there was directed biocontrol. Cats would fall into a more historical and not as pointed example. Part of the WP:DUE aspect is that a lot of the research has been related to insects where general predation isn't focused on as much (relatively), but species-specific controls like many parasitoids. That's what the field of study largely took off from, so that's where sources tend to focus. Kingofaces43 (talk) 15:13, 23 March 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  Definitional problems 

message: Pestiphages (Latin: pestis «pest» + greek. φαγεῖν «to eat»)Yericyan S., Grigoryan H. - «Fundamentals of organic farming», p. 66, Manual, 2019, Yerevan, 112 p., ISBN 978‐9939‐78‐022‐1:, — introduced organisms, that destroy pest organisms in agroecosystems. Pestiphages are an important biological component of agrobiodiversity and have a substantial role in ecologization of agriculture. Pest organisms of agrocenosis and pestiphages are in detrimental type of biological interaction. The inhibitive influence of pestiphages have bioregulated the populations of pest organisms.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hovsep Grigoryan (talk • contribs) 21:28, 1 January 2021 (UTC)
thread_title:  A new formulation in science - Pestiphages 

message: Hi  and  It looks like IBMA is here to promote their own organization. Nonetheless I think this edit was mostly appropriate. The IBMA seems relevant to this page. I suggest we just leave the Bacillus thuringiensis link out because that's already mentioned in the article. Invasive Spices (talk) 19:22, 14 May 2021 (UTC)
thread_title: Conflict of interest editing

message: "Biological control" is by an order of magnitude the most common name for this topic. It should never have been moved to "Biological pest control". I'll revert it now. Chiswick Chap (talk) 14:54, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks like the redirect was way back in 2003 that really wasn't ever an article in the first place. I'm personally fine with biological pest control though and don't see any issues with it. Us entomologists, etc. do indeed use biological control, but the current title is a bit more informative for readers who may not be familiar with it as a sort of natural disambiguation. KoA (talk) 15:02, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
replies: text:  Many thanks for checking. The usual practice is to use the most common name (I've seen editors get *really* insistent on this point), and there is no doubt that "Biological control" is by far the most common. But I think it's also the better term, as the control is or could be of a wide range of conditions including microbial pathogens, for instance. Perhaps someone felt that adding "pest" was helpful to very young or ignorant readers, but we should not be talking down to our readership; it is far less confusing to be introduced to the most common term, which one will then come across in scientific or other publications all over the literature. Chiswick Chap (talk) 15:13, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Title 

message: KoA, you appear to be asserting that a pathogen, something that causes disease, is a kind of pest. In that case, a person who works to prevent or treat disease is a pest control agent: better tell the vaccinators, pharmacists, doctors, nurses, and vets that they're pest controllers then. Joking apart, this simply isn't normal usage. A pest is a rather loosely defined thing, something that's basically a nuisance to someone, whether a farmer (spray it), a holidaymaker (rub on some mosquito repellent), or someone riding the metro (tread on their foot). A pathogen is a disease agent, like a malaria parasite, a coronavirus, a streptococcus bacterium. Honestly, we don't call treating those "pest control". I'll tweak the text, if you don't mind. Chiswick Chap (talk) 19:49, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: Pest management absolutely does deal with pathogens, which are just one subset of pest organisms. That's nothing controversial. Pest control gives a good primer on this:  Whether it's agriculture, conservation, public health, etc. there's a pretty wide diversity of pests out there. KoA (talk) 19:59, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
replies: text:  Something's gone very wrong over there. As they say, "Wikipedia is not a reliable source". Chiswick Chap (talk) 20:02, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
replies: text: If decades of sources have suddenly had a huge paradigm shift that pathogens are no longer pests, that really does needs a lot of strong sources outright stating that. That would mean we'd have to no longer consider fungicides a type of pesticide for one, and I can think of quite a few plant pathologists that would be rather shocked that such a thing happened without them knowing. At least in the agriculture science world, plant pathology, entomology, and weed science are the three main pest disciplines, but when you get outside of ag., then you have a lot of public health related disease pests like malaria, etc. you mentioned. KoA (talk) 20:54, 27 April 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pests, pathogens and other perils