Efficacy of Trunk Injected Imidacloprid and Oxytetracycline in Managing Huanglongbing and Asian Citrus Psyllid in Infected Sweet Orange ( Citrus sinensis ) Trees

Leigh Archer, Jawwad Qureshi and Ute Albrecht ()
Additional contact information
Leigh Archer: Southwest Florida Research and Education Center, Horticultural Sciences Department, Institute of Food and Agricultural Science, University of Florida, Immokalee, FL 34142, USA
Jawwad Qureshi: Southwest Florida Research and Education Center, Entomology and Nematology Department, Institute of Food and Agricultural Science, University of Florida, Immokalee, FL 34142, USA
Ute Albrecht: Southwest Florida Research and Education Center, Horticultural Sciences Department, Institute of Food and Agricultural Science, University of Florida, Immokalee, FL 34142, USA

Agriculture, 2022, vol. 12, issue 10, 1-24

Abstract: Traditional foliar spray and soil drench applications of crop protection compounds have been ineffective at managing huanglongbing (HLB) in citrus. Trunk injection is a technique that delivers crop protection compounds directly into the tree vasculature, which optimizes compound availability while minimizing drift, runoff, and damage to non-target organisms. Five-year-old HLB-affected ‘Valencia’ sweet orange ( Citrus sinensis ) trees were injected with the insecticide imidacloprid or the antibacterial oxytetracycline in October 2020 and April 2021. Trees were monitored for tree health, psyllid colonization, bacterial titers, fruit quality, fruit drop, and yield for two production seasons. Imidacloprid injection caused 63% mortality of psyllid adults within one week and reduced progeny survival by 80%, though the efficacy waned within two months. Injection with oxytetracycline significantly improved tree health, reduced bacterial titers, and reduced preharvest fruit drop by more than 3-fold with corresponding increases in yield. Residue dynamics varied by injected compound and tissue analyzed. These results suggest trunk injection could be an effective delivery method for existing or novel therapeutics targeting either the insect vector or the pathogen causing HLB.

Keywords: citrus greening; systemic delivery; chemotherapy; bactericide (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q1 Q10 Q11 Q12 Q13 Q14 Q15 Q16 Q17 Q18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/12/10/1592/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2077-0472/12/10/1592/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jagris:v:12:y:2022:i:10:p:1592-:d:931570

Access Statistics for this article

Agriculture is currently edited by Ms. Leda Xuan

More articles in Agriculture from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().