Effects of population dispersal and impulsive control tactics on pest management

Abstract

In this paper, we firstly consider a Lotka–Volterra predator–prey model with impulsive constant releasing for natural enemies and a proportion of killing or catching pests at fixed moments, and we have proved that there exists a pest-eradication periodic solution which is globally asymptotically stable. Further, we extend the model for the population to move in a two-patch environment. The effects of population dispersal and impulsive control tactics are investigated, i.e. we chiefly address the question of whether population dispersal is beneficial or detrimental for pest persistence. To do this, some special cases are theoretically investigated and numerical investigations are done for general case. The results indicate that for some ranges of dispersal rates, population dispersal is beneficial to pest control, but for other ranges, it is harmful. These clarify that we can get some new effective pest control strategies by controlling the dispersal rates of pests and natural enemies.