Chasing or tracking individual animals has been used to understand the distribution or migratory behavior of whales, birds, and some large terrestrial animals by using mark-recapture methods or attaching signal transmitters to their bodies. However, in an entomological study, individual tracking is generally not applicable for non-migratory insects not only because they are very small but because there are too many to be tracked individually. For this reason, studies on insect distributions have focused on population level descriptions using distribution indices. Currently, three advanced technologies, satellites, biosensors, and the geographic information system (GIS), might enable researchers to track insect populations without counting the number of insects in the field. These technologies can sense insects, position the locations where insects are, and map the distribution of insects. This study was designed to develop new tools to determine where insects exist in the field by using satellites as a global positioning system (GPS), the GIS as a mapping and analytical tool, and the electoantennogram (EAG) as a biosensor. Two major corn pests, corn rootworms and corn earworms, were used to test the efficiency of these new tools in five cornfields. Advantages and disadvantages of these new tools to track insect population are discussed in the presentation.
Species 1: Coleoptera Chrysomelidae Diabrotica virgifera virgifera (western corn rootworm)
Species 2: Coleoptera Chrysomelidae Diabrotica barberi (northern corn rootworm)
Species 3: Lepidoptera Noctuidae Helicoverpa zea (corn earworm)
Keywords: electroantennogram, global positioning system
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