Heterorhabditis heliothidis is reared monoxenically on an artificial medium consisting of commercially available nutrient broth, yeast extract, and vegetable oil. These components are cooked with flour and coated onto polyether polyurethane sponge, autoclaved, inoculated with a suspension of the bacterial symbiont of the nematode, and incubated at 25 C for 3 d. The bacterial garden on sponge pr...

Injection, contact, and soil assays were used to compare infectivity of Heterorhabditis bacteriophora strain HP88 and Steinernema carpocapsae strain All to final instar Galleria mellonella larvae. Under comparable assay conditions, H. bacteriophora produced less Galleria mortality and showed greater within-assay variability in infectivity than S. carpocapsae. Injection of individual S. carpocap...

The Indianmeal moth, Plodia interpunctella (Hübner), is a cosmopolitan pest of stored products, infesting most commodities in warehouses and grain bins. We studied the susceptibility of Indianmeal moth adults and larvae to seven entomopathogenic nematode species and strains. The nematodes studied wereHeterorhabditis bacteriophora Poinar (HP88, Lewiston, andOswego strains); H. indicaPoinar,Karun...

Nematodes are worm-shaped nearly microscopic animals, many of which are virtually invisible to the unaided eye when they are in the soil or within plant material. Of the known nematode species, approximately 50%, 25%, 15%, and 10% are free-living, marine, animal parasites, and plant parasitic nematodes (PPNs), respectively. Freeliving nematodes are very important in maintaining the soil bio-dyn...

Mustard (Brassica and Sinapis spp.) green manures tilled into the soil preceding potato crops act as biofumigants that are toxic to plant–parasitic nematodes, providing an alternative to synthetic soil fumigants. However, it is not known whether mustard green manures also kill beneficial entomopathogenic nematodes (EPNs) that contribute to the control of pest insects. We used sentinel insect pr...

Control of Delia radicum (cabbage maggot) in field collards (Brassica oleracea) was compared after one or two applications of entomopathogenic nematodes, Steinernema carpocapsae (All strain) and Heterorhabditis bacterophora (HP88 strain), a single application of granular chlorpyrifos, and a water-only treatment. Nematodes were applied with a sprayer during the egg stage of first-generation D. r...

There is considerable evidence that both plant diversity and plant identity can influence the level of predation and predator abundance aboveground. However, how the level of predation in the soil and the abundance of predatory soil fauna are related to plant diversity and identity remains largely unknown. In a biodiversity field experiment, we examined the effects of plant diversity and identi...

The entomopathogenic nematode Heterorhabditis sp. SL0708 (Rhabditida: Heterorhabditidae) isolated from soil in Alcalá, Valle del Cauca (Colombia) was characterised ecologically using Galleria mellonella larvae (L) (Pyralidae: Galleriinae) as hosts. The effect of temperature on the viability, infectivity and reproduction, and of moisture on infectivity and storage in liquid were evaluated in inf...

Three Gram-stain-negative, rod-shaped, non-spore-forming bacteria, BA1 T , Q614 and PB68.1 isolated from the digestive system of Heterorhabditis entomopathogenic nematodes, were biochemically molecularly characterized to clarify their taxonomic affiliations. The 16S rRNA gene sequences these strains suggest that they belong Gammaproteobacteria, family Morganellacea genus Photorhabdus . Deeper a...

Three Gram-stain-negative, rod-shaped, non-spore-forming bacteria, BA1 T , Q614 and PB68.1 isolated from the digestive system of Heterorhabditis entomopathogenic nematodes, were biochemically molecularly characterized to clarify their taxonomic affiliations. The 16S rRNA gene sequences these strains suggest that they belong Gammaproteobacteria, family Morganellacea genus Photorhabdus . Deeper a...