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Beneficial Agents on the Farm
Introduction
Biological control is the use of natural enemies to manage pests.
The natural enemy might be a predator, parasite, or disease that
will attack the insect pest. Biological control is a form of enhancing
natural defenses to achieve a desired effect. It usually involves
raising and releasing one insect to have it attack another, almost
like a “living insecticide.” You can facilitate a biological
control program by timing pesticide applications or choosing pesticides
that will be least harmful to beneficial insects.
A durable biological control program depends on two main strategies:
1) Using ecological farm design to make your farm more attractive
to biological control “agents.”
2) Introducing beneficial agents onto your farm.
When plant pathogens are not inhibited by naturally occurring enemies,
you can improve biocontrol by adding more effective beneficials.
Such “directed biocontrol” operates in several ways.
As naturally occurring enemies would do, introduced beneficials
may:
 produce
antibiotics
parasitize
target organisms
form
physical or chemical barriers to infection
outcompete
plant pathogens for niches
simply
help the plant grow better, masking symptoms where disease is
present.
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