Effect of neem-derived plant protection products on the isopod species Porcellionidespruinosus (Brandt, 1833).

Pratik Doshi,Mark Szalai,György Turóczi,Anett Mészárosné Póss,Ferenc Tóth

doi:10.3897/zookeys.801.25510

Abstract

Neem-based products have gained major attention over the last few years due to their wide range of applications in pest management, and have been in the focus of biological plant protection research in the past decade. Yet, there is limited information available to understand the side effects of these neem-derived pesticides on non-target species in soil. Therefore, Porcellionidespruinosus, a terrestrial isopod, was chosen as a non-target species to investigate such possible effects. Two different experiments were conducted to study two different neem-derived plant protection products, i.e., NeemAzal T/S (1% azadirachtin) which is a commercial product registered in the EU, and neem leaf extract from dried neem leaves (1%).The latter simulates the plant protection product, is domestically produced, and widely used by farmers in India and other tropical and subtropical countries. Findings are consistent with previous results obtained with other non-target organisms, i.e., neither of the tested neem products have adverse effects on the mortality of P.pruinosus. However, further research on a wider range of soil organisms is needed to prove the safety of neem-based products as biological control agents and to be part of integrated pest management.

Highlights

Different environmental conditions and chemical stressors may interact and can have a negative impact on the soil biota (Morgado et al 2016)
In this paper we present results on the side-effect of NeemAzal T/S and neem leaf extract on the terrestrial isopod species Porcellionides pruinosus
Scott and Kaushik (1998) assessed the effect of Margosan-O on non-target aquatic invertebrates. Their investigation revealed that there can be some effects of the product on non-target organisms at higher concentration but if applied in agricultural systems, Margosan-O may not reduce the survival or reproduction of the non-target aquatic organisms

Summary

Introduction

Different environmental conditions and chemical stressors may interact and can have a negative impact on the soil biota (Morgado et al 2016). The long-term effects of indiscriminate and excessive use of synthetic pesticides induced research to develop alternative biological control strategies (Gurjar et al 2012) which needs to be cost effective, non-toxic, biodegradable, eco-friendly (Girish and Bhat 2008). Such non-chemical and biological pest control methods are fundamental to organic farming but they are involved in the basic principles of sustainable integrated pest management (Barzman et al 2015). Amongst the wide variety of biological control agents available, plantderived crude products or formulated pesticides are very popular because their use can be both efficient and economically rational (Gahukar 2014). Juss) which has been known in the Indian sub-continent for more than 4000 years (Boursier et al 2011)

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Conclusion