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Yuzhen Wen, Tao Ma, Xuan Chen, Zhitao Liu, Chengqi Zhu, Yuanyuan Zhang, Rachel Strecker, Gregg Henderson, Linda M. Hooper-Bùi, Xiaoyang Chen, Zhaohui Sun, Xiujun Wen, Cai Wang, Essential Balm: A Strong Repellent Against Foraging and Defending Red Imported Fire Ants (Hymenoptera: Formicidae), Journal of Economic Entomology, Volume 109, Issue 4, August 2016, Pages 1827–1833, https://doi.org/10.1093/jee/tow130
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Abstract
In the present study, the repellent effects of essential balm, a traditional medicine product in China, was tested against foraging and defending red imported fire ants, Solenopsis invicta Buren, under laboratory and field conditions. The laboratory study showed that both band- (width = 1 cm) and patch-smearing of essential balm at each concentration (0.5, 1, or 2 μl/cm2) significantly decreased the number of S. invicta foragers within the 6-h observation period. Moreover, band-smearing of 2 μl/cm2 essential balm and patch-smearing of 0.5, 1, and 2 μl/cm2 essential balm inhibited most S. invicta foraging activity at 3, 6, 6, and 24 h into the experiment, respectively. The field study showed that after a disturbance was created on the S. invicta mound, there were significantly less defending ants on the substance treated (patch-smeared) with 0.5, 1, and 2 μl/cm2 essential balm than the controls, but the number of ants on the substance of these three concentrations was similar. Our study suggested that essential balm is a strong repellent against foraging and defending S. invicta and could be applied when temporary protection from S. invicta is needed.