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Abstract:

Recently, outbreaks of the green peach aphid have become more frequent and intense in sweet pepper production. This increased frequency and intensity may be directly related due to pesticide resistance and the presence of natural enemy pests. Therefore, new strategies are needed to maintain successful IPM. One such strategy may be through reducing the impact hyperparasitoids have in the IPM of green peach aphids. Currently, little is known about the temporal diversity of hyperparasitoid outbreaks in the cultivation of sweet pepper and no effective control strategy exists. Therefore, we set out to study the temporal diversity of hyperparasitoids in the 2022 cropping season in the Flanders region of Belgium. Hyperparasitoid diversity was assessed by placing wheat plants with parasitized wheat aphids in 5 commercial greenhouses for one week. Afterwards the wheat plants were removed and shoots with mummies were placed in a climate chamber until eclosion. Eclosed (hyper-)parasitoids were identified and counted. Over the entire survey period, six hyperparasitoid genera were identified. Of the identified genera, Dendrocerus spp. hyperparasitoids were the most abundant, with the species Dendrocerus aphidum being the most detected species. Hyperparasitoids could be found in March in one farm, but by April all farms had a high presence of hyperparasitoids.