SOLAR HEATING OF CHIVES FOR CONTROLLING THRIPS

D. Ben-Yakir, M. Chen, S. Pivonia, M. Amichai, D. Silverman
Chives are herbaceous perennial plants grown all year around in walk in tunnels covered by polyethylene films and screens. The leaves of chives are used fresh as a flavoring herb and are harvested once a month. The onion thrips, Thrips tabaci, is an important pest of chives causing silver spots on the leaves that make them unfit for marketing. Only a few pesticides are permitted for the control of thrips in chives and they are frequently ineffective due to the development of resistant thrips populations. A two treatments procedure was developed for controlling thrips in chives by solar heat. Plants were cut to a height of 3-5 cm and then covered with a transparent polyethylene film in the morning. The polyethylene film was removed few hours later, after the temperature inside the plants’ canopy was above 40oC for about 2 hrs. This treatment caused only minor heat damage to the chives plants while killing most of the thrips. Because the pupal stage of thrips develops in the ground and it has a low metabolic rate, it was not controlled efficiently by a single heat treatment. Therefore, a second heat treatment was given 3-5 days after the first one, when most adults emerged from the pupae. In Israel, this procedure can be used during clear days from spring to autumn, in most regions that chives is grown. Covering chives with polyethylene film that prevent water condensation (anti-drip) increased temperatures by 3-4°C over the temperatures under standard polyethylene film. Therefore, anti-drip polyethylene film may be useful for solar heat treatments during cooler or cloudy days.
Ben-Yakir, D., Chen, M., Pivonia, S., Amichai, M. and Silverman, D. (2014). SOLAR HEATING OF CHIVES FOR CONTROLLING THRIPS . Acta Hortic. 1015, 123-128
DOI: 10.17660/ActaHortic.2014.1015.13
https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.2014.1015.13
onion thrips, chives, lethal temperatures, solarization, plastic film
English

Acta Horticulturae