Chill Out Sucking Pests! Quiz

Discover essential strategies for managing sucking pests in chili crops, including identification, cultural practices, and biological controls. Test your knowledge of effective and sustainable pest management within horticultural agriculture.

1. Identifying Common Sucking Pests

   Which of the following is a common sucking pest that causes curling and yellowing of chili leaves by feeding on sap?

   1. Aphids
   2. Leaf miners
   3. Fruit borers
   4. Root-knot nematodes

   Explanation: Aphids are small insects that suck sap from chili leaves, causing curling, yellowing, and stunted growth. Leaf miners create tunnels inside leaves rather than sucking sap. Fruit borers attack the fruit, not the leaves. Root-knot nematodes damage roots instead of above-ground parts.

2. Cultural Control Methods

   What is an effective cultural practice for reducing the population of thrips in a chili crop?

   1. Field sanitation
   2. Applying fungicides
   3. Deep plowing after harvest
   4. Using sticky traps

   Explanation: Field sanitation involves removing plant debris and weeds, which can harbor thrips and their eggs, reducing their populations. Fungicides target fungi, not insects. Deep plowing may disrupt some pests but is less directly effective against thrips. Sticky traps help monitor rather than directly reduce thrips populations.

3. Biological Pest Control

   Introducing which natural enemy can help biologically control whiteflies in chili cultivation?

   1. Predatory mites
   2. Green lacewings
   3. Ladybird beetles
   4. Braconid wasps

   Explanation: Green lacewings are known predators of whiteflies, effectively preying on their eggs and larvae. Ladybird beetles mainly target aphids. Predatory mites usually control mite pests, while Braconid wasps parasitize caterpillars rather than whiteflies.

4. Insecticide Use and Resistance

   What is an important reason for rotating different classes of insecticides when managing sucking pests in chili?

   1. To reduce cost
   2. To slow pest resistance
   3. To attract pollinators
   4. To increase fruit size

   Explanation: Rotating insecticide classes helps prevent pests from developing resistance due to repeated exposure to a single type. Rotation does not inherently reduce costs, affect fruit size, or attract pollinators, which are unrelated to insecticide resistance management.

5. Sucking Pest Damage Recognition

   If a chili farmer observes silvery streaks and distorted leaves on plants, which pest is most likely responsible?

   1. White grub
   2. Thrips
   3. Cutworms
   4. Stemborers

   Explanation: Thrips feeding causes silvery streaks and leaf distortion by rasping plant tissues and sucking out the contents. Cutworms typically cut seedlings at the base. Stemborers damage stems, not leaves, and white grubs feed on roots, not above-ground parts of the plant.