Efficacy and longevity of essential oil lures for capture of the redbay ambrosia beetle Xyleborus glabratus (Coleoptera: Curculionidae: Scolytinae)

The redbay ambrosia beetle Xyleborus glabratus Eichhoff is an exotic wood-boring pest native to southeastern Asia. It carries a symbiotic fungus (Raffaelea lauricola) that causes laurel wilt, a lethal vascular disease of trees in the Lauraceae. First detected in Georgia in 2002, the beetle has spread south through Florida causing high mortality in redbay and swampbay, and threatening commercial avocado production. There is a critical need for effective attractants to detect and control the spread of this invasive pest. Previous reports showed that manuka and phoebe oils (essential oil extracts from Leptospermum scoparium and Phoebe porosa trees, respectively) were attractive baits for monitoring X. glabratus. The suspected attractants from those oils were two volatile sesquiterpenes, α-copaene and calamenene. We report here a combination of field trapping studies and chemical analysis evaluating attraction of redbay ambrosia beetle to commercial phoebe and manuka lures in relation to the release rates of putative attractants over a 12-week period.