Aromatic plants and chili pepper intercropping as a pest management strategy

The cultivation of peppers in northern Brazil has grown recently influenced by the increase in consumption, culinary usefulness, and medicinal features. However, pest insects damage plants and fruits, impairing production. This work investigates the management of pepper pests by intercropping plants that provide multiple ecosystem services, especially conservative biological control of pests. The experiment was carried out at the Federal Institute of Pará, Campus Rural de Marabá, Pará. The experimental design consisted of randomized blocks, with four treatments and five replications. Each plot contained thirty plants. The sampling of arthropods was carried out weekly in the useful portion of each treatment, through direct counting (visual analysis) and tapping plants on a white tray. The average abundance of arthropods in each functional group was calculated over the sampling weeks. We counted the number of fruits and bored fruits per plant to evaluate the effect of treatments on pepper yield. The abundance of pollinators differed significantly among treatments. Intercropping may favor the establishment of natural enemies and reduce the impacts of chemical insecticides.

Abstract licence: CC BY

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